


get you the moon

by voidpen



Series: can we kiss forever? [2]
Category: Atypical (TV 2017), Legacies (TV 2018), The Originals (TV), The Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: Angst, Endgame, F/F, Fluff, Lots of Angst, Vampires, Witches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-22
Updated: 2019-10-12
Packaged: 2020-05-16 13:29:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 47,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19319158
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/voidpen/pseuds/voidpen
Summary: Three years after finding out that Penelope is the key to stopping the merge, the girls have one month left to find Nature's loophole before the twins' twenty-second birthday.





	1. -30 days

**Author's Note:**

> Here we go, folks. What comes after a promise.

“An angel? Really?”

  
Josie’s train of thought was run off course when she heard those words coming from the direction of her dorm room door. Back straightening, she turned her head to welcome the intrusion.

  
“Lizzie’s idea. She says we balance each other out, meaning that if she wants to go dressed as a, and I quote, sexy demon, I get to go looking like a 12-year-old. _Fun_.”

  
Hope’s laughter ran through the empty room. Josie hadn’t exactly been expecting company. The seniors were organizing a Halloween party that night, which naturally meant Lizzie would be going all out to try and impress as many people as she could, which apparently also included laying out Josie's costume for her on the bed. 

  
“Figures. Well, at least she put some effort into your costumes. I was just planning on digging out the old Hybrid eyes and fangs. What about Penelope?”

  
All it took was one mention of the name for Josie’s face to break out into the biggest and dorkiest grin anyone had probably ever seen. It had been three years since Josie had caught up to Penelope before she’d run away from Salvatore. Three years since she’d told Penelope that she loved her, and that she was never going to let her go again.

  
They were in college now. And the girls had somehow all managed to end up at the same university. Josie and Penelope wanted to spend as little time apart as they could. Lizzie would deny it if you asked her, but she wanted to be near Josie too. And Hope… Josie had initially thought that the Hybrid was following Penelope, worried that her best friend might do something stupid while they were apart, but now Josie wasn’t so sure.

  
Their majors were the perfect reflections of their personalities. Lizzie was a Law major; she never missed an opportunity to argue and prove, with excruciating detail, why she was right all of the time. Hope had chosen to go into the arts program to honor her father’s legacy, and Josie knew he would have been so proud of the person his daughter had grown up to be. Penelope was an English major, and she was also minoring in Psychology because there was nothing on this earth Penelope Park couldn’t do. As for Josie, she went into Social Work. She wanted so badly to do as much good as she could with the time that she had left.

  
The plan was to be hopeful. The plan was that, once she and Penelope graduated, they would move somewhere quiet. They would live for as long as their circumstances allowed them. But that’s as far as Penelope ever let Josie say. Josie was trying to be hopeful because Penelope needed her to be, but if it had been up to her from the beginning, she and Penelope would have run away together a long time ago.

  
“I _may_ or may not have convinced her to go as a witch.”

  
“Aha, let me guess; Slytherin witch? Does the angel have a kink?”

  
Josie tried her best to suppress the blush that crept up on the back of her neck at the thought of Penelope in her costume. Penelope couldn’t have cared less about Halloween, except Josie had mentioned how hot Penelope would look in Slytherin robes once, and a glint immediately made its way to the witch’s eyes. It was really no secret that Josie was a geek, but geeks were human too.

  
“Speaking of angels, what’s Davina going as?”

  
“I don’t know actually… She hadn’t decided when I last saw her. Actually, she was seriously considering skipping the whole thing and staying in.”

  
“What? No, she has to come. She’s spent way too much time helping us try to figure out a way out of this mess to skip out on a chance to have some fun. She deserves a break… we all do.”

  
Josie’s mind went back to Penelope. Ever since they had gotten back together, the girl had been dead-set on doing every last possible thing in her power to find the loophole that was owed to them.

  
Weary eyes. Skinny bones. Gentle hands.  
That’s how Josie would describe Penelope ever since they found out their fates were intertwined. She was still beautiful - more than beautiful, although Josie didn’t understand how that was possible. Her hair had grown longer, and her smile had gotten softer. And every time Josie looked at her, her heart melted in her chest. But she also looked sadder, weaker, and more desperate to protect Josie than ever. She had a reason to live again. She had something to lose. She wanted to survive so that she and Josie could be together forever. If only their lives were that simple.

  
“Jo… are you okay?”

  
“Hm? Yeah, I’m fine. Can you please just make sure she gets to the party?”

  
“Who’s not coming to the party?”

  
She was standing by the door, leaning her weight against the frame. Her arms were crossed across her chest, and she was looking at Josie the same way she always did.

  
_Weary eyes. Skinny bones._

  
Penelope made her way to Josie slowly, wrapping her arms around Josie’s waist and resting her chin on her shoulder as soon as they were close enough.

  
_Gentle hands._

  
“Hi, love.”

  
It was barely a whisper, but it didn’t need to be. Pretty much everyone on campus knew they were together. They were inseparable most of the time. They spent their days together, accommodating classes just enough to be able to learn and scrape up a passing grade. They spent their nights together too. It was the only way Josie could fall asleep now, a reminder of how things used to be when they were teenagers. She had gotten so used to being loved by Penelope that she couldn’t remember a time when she wasn’t, a time when they were anything other than completely and madly in love. She didn’t know how she had ever survived without this. Penelope stayed with Josie every night, right up until Josie fell asleep, and as soon as she did, Penelope headed to the library. Every single night, she buried herself in stacks of old books and worn-out pages. She stayed up as long as her eyes allowed her to, sometimes falling asleep in the library, and sometimes as soon as Josie was in her arms again. She gave so much of herself to this that it made Josie feel guilty for not doing the same. Not that she would ever tell Penelope why that was.

  
“Hey, Penny.”

  
Lips pressed to the back of Josie’s shoulder, Penelope tightened her hold on her, trying to get as close as she could with what energy she had left. She was close enough for Josie to make out the faint dark circles under her eyes, for Josie to be able to tell that she was wearing the same clothes she wore the day before.

  
“Um... get a room, perhaps?”

  
Penelope’s low laugh left goosebumps on her skin. God, Josie would give anything to have that be the only sound she heard for the rest of her life.

  
“Technically, we already have one. You’re kind of crashing, Mikaelson. What would sweet Landon say if he were here?”

  
“Well, _my_ boyfriend’s not here. So I guess I’ll just…”

  
Hope turned her back to leave with a peace sign raised up for them to see, and as soon as the door closed behind her, Penelope turned Josie around, so they were facing each other. Josie’s arms wrapped around her girlfriend’s neck like it was the most natural thing in the world, and Penelope’s found their way to her lower back, resting there like they had a thousand times before.

  
Their kisses generally alternated between two states, depending on whether or not they were thinking of the same thing. Sometimes it was urgent, desperate; like they had less than 60 seconds left on this earth and there was nothing else either of them would rather do; no one else they would rather be with. And other times it was slow, delicate. Those were Josie’s favorites, and this was one of them. Penelope seemed to be in a good mood. Smiling into the kiss, her eyes stayed closed as Josie moved her head back a little to take the sight of Penelope in. When they opened again, she was still smiling.

  
“Angel.”

  
“I’m not dressed yet.”

  
“Doesn’t matter.”

  
Josie had thought a lot about how far they had come over the past few years. She had finally become her own person, stepping out of the shadow she had created for herself under her twin. With Penelope’s help, she learned her worth. She learned to fight for herself, and what she wanted. She was still there for her twin when Lizzie needed her to be, of course, but she also drew limits; and it helped that Lizzie needed her less and less now, partly thanks to how close her and Hope had gotten; but mostly because Lizzie had done her fair share of growing too. They had all grown in that way, faster than most girls their age. She supposed it was understandable given their current situation.

  
The twins were turning 22 next month.

  
Their clock was ticking faster than ever, and nothing was changing. Hope had enlisted Davina’s help, who had transferred here her last semester to be closer to them. Davina was a powerful witch from New Orleans that Hope was friends with before she moved to Mystic Falls. She had left her home, right after losing the love of her life, and hopped on a plane to help save two girls she didn’t even know. As hard as Josie tried, there was nothing she could ever do or say to repay her.

  
Her mom was still trying, still traveling the world, although now she was looking for something else. Her and Penelope’s relationship was strained at best. Neither of them could get past what they meant to each other. Penelope had lost her entire family at the hands of the woman who had saved and raised the love of her life. Caroline had to live with the fact that she had taken innocent lives in the name of protecting her own. They did their best to avoid each other, and even though it hurt Josie more than she ever let herself show, it wasn’t her place to try to mend things between them. She wasn’t that naïve. People didn't just come back from things like that.

  
“Hey… where are you right now?”

  
Josie’s eyes came back into focus, realizing Penelope had just asked her a question. “What? Oh, I’m right here. I missed you.”

  
“Jojo, I saw you three hours ago…”

  
“So? I’m not allowed to miss my girlfriend?”

  
“Well, when you put it like that…”

  
She couldn’t help the squeal that escaped her lips at the unexpectedness of the situation. The next thing Josie knew, her legs were wrapped around Penelope’s waist, and then her back was on her own bed. She looked up at Penelope – hair messy and lips parted – and pushed every doomsday scenario out of her mind until the only thing left between them was soft sheets and soon-to-be-scattered clothes.

  
A few hours later, they were walking into some random frat house on campus. Lizzie had texted them all the address and they had agreed to meet on the porch. Josie and Penelope were the last of the group to get to the party. Hope was sitting on the steps, beer in hand, looking as gloomy as ever. A short distance away, inside of the house, Lizzie was wrapped around a boy Josie had never seen before. It was always strange seeing her like this. A part of her was relieved her twin had learned how to detach herself from boys she liked, to protect herself from jerk-types who were inevitably going to break her heart. Ever since the incident with Rafael the night he’d sedated Josie and Penelope had come to her rescue, it was like a light had finally gone on in Lizzie’s mind. She decided she was tired of being hurt by lesser boys, so she closed herself off to them all. And this was who she decided to be.

  
“Hey Hope, is Davina here?”

  
“Yeah, she’s inside. She decided to come at the last second, so she’s not dressed up. I think I saw her talking to some girl earlier. It seemed like they were hitting it off, so I gave her some space.”

  
“That’s good. I’m glad.”

  
Hope eyed her and Penelope’s costumes for a moment, a sly smile forming on her face. “You know, I was skeptical about the outfits at first, but I kind of see it now. I guess opposites _do_ attract.”

  
She felt Penelope’s hand lift from her lower back and then felt her fingers interlock with her own.

  
“We’re going to go get some drinks now... before you give my girlfriend an aneurysm and she starts to feel self-conscious for _no reason_.”

  
Josie knew Hope was just teasing, but for whatever reason, she _was_ starting to feel self-conscious. She was pretty sure angels weren’t supposed to be this… exposed… but leave it to Lizzie to spice things up a bit. She just didn’t realize how obvious she was being about it until she felt Penelope take off her robe and drape it across her shoulders. Josie looked over at her girlfriend and saw the slightly oversized white shirt tucked into her black pants, and the striped green tie hanging loosely around her neck.

  
Perhaps, she _did_ have a kink. Dragging Penelope to the back of the house, looking for as much privacy as she could find, Josie lifted her girlfriend’s shirt from under her pants and ran her hands across Penelope’s stomach. She left a trail of kisses from the exposed area of skin near Penelope’s chest, up towards the side of her face.

  
Josie brought her lips to Penelope’s ear, whispering out her next words, “Still think I’m a Hufflepuff?”

  
She felt Penelope’s low laugh against the side of her face, “Point taken. You’re actually a Slytherin deep down, aren’t you, Jojo?”

  
With the way Penelope was looking at her, things would’ve escalated pretty quickly between them had it not been for the noise they heard coming from the back porch. Judging by the confused look on Penelope’s face, she had heard it too. Straining to try and hear better, Josie was able to make out what was being said, despite how low it was.

  
“…You’re not going to scream. You’re okay. You’re not going to feel this, and you won’t remember any of what happened tonight after I’m gone…”

  
Josie looked to see if Penelope had heard the same thing she did, and based on the concern in her eyes, she must have. The next thing she heard made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. It was the sound of teeth digging into flesh. Before she knew it, she was rushing outside to try and stop it before it was too late. Penelope tried to slow her down, but it was of no use. A few seconds later, they were both on the porch, faced with the sight of a raven-haired girl, fangs deep in some other girl’s neck. The only girl who wasn’t dressed up for a Halloween party.

  
_Davina._

  
“Hey!”

  
The vampire lifted her head from Davina’s neck as soon as the word left Josie’s mouth, eyes red, fangs out, and blood dripping down her jaw. Josie could now tell that she was wearing a black mask and a black cape. Not much effort was put into the costume, so it must’ve been more of a disguise.

  
Josie thought she saw a hint of panic in the raven-haired girl’s eyes just before she disappeared into the woods. Davina’s body slacked, about to fall to the floor had Josie not caught her in time. She was lowering her to the ground carefully when Davina regained consciousness. “Josie? What’s going on?”

  
“You don’t remember?”

  
Trying to sit up straight, Davina moved her hand to cover the open patch of skin on her neck, “Remember wha- Ow! What is that?”

  
“Davina, look at me. Focus. You were talking to a girl, right? Can you remember her? Did she tell you her name?”

  
“I-I don’t know. I remember getting a text from Hope that said you really wanted me to come tonight. I was already late, so I decided not to bother with a costume. But when I got here… I don’t know…”

  
Josie placed her hand over Davina’s wound, as gently as she could, wincing at Davina’s gasp, and felt the magic flow through her as she healed her. “You were compelled. If you'd seen it coming you would have protected yourself, but she must've caught you off guard. You were with a girl – she compelled you to forget her and then fed on you. Penelope and I thought we heard something, so we came out to see what was happening, and we found you.”

  
Josie realized Penelope must have texted Hope and Lizzie because when she looked up, she was met with three pairs of eyes staring down at her and Davina, worry clearly etched onto their faces.

  
“What happened?”

  
Their concern only added to her own. She had a bad feeling about this. Things were about to get more and more complicated.

  
"There's a vampire in town."


	2. -26 days

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A perfect day, until it isn't.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Major fluff ahead, proceed at your own peril. Plus, big vamp! reveal at the end. Hope you know who she is (not from the TVD/TO/L universe, forgive me) but if not, I'll post a picture of her on my twitter. Enjoy, babies.

On regular days, the first thing Josie thought of when she woke up was Penelope.

 

 

The girls had found out early on that they’d gotten lucky with their room assignments. It turned out that attending the same university as your twin meant your roommate was already decided for you. When Josie first found this out, a part of her was relieved she wouldn’t have to share a room with a complete stranger, but then she realized that, as much as she loved her twin, what she really wanted was to be with Penelope. She’d thought it over briefly and decided it would make their lives infinitely better. Same room meant privacy. Same room meant living together. Same room meant Penelope was guaranteed to be the last thing Josie saw before she fell asleep, and the first thing she saw after she woke up.

 

 

The only downside to this was the days when Josie would reach her arm across the bed and be met with nothing but cold sheets, and today was one of those days.

 

 

Penelope wasn’t there, and Josie resigned herself to the reality that she had probably gone to the library. Usually, as much as it killed her to know that Penelope had barely slept and probably barely eaten, she didn't say anything; because how could she?

 

 

How do you tell the person you love most in the world that you want them to stop trying to save your life? 

 

 

They had gotten into arguments about it before. Josie’s number one priority was making sure Penelope was safe and happy, and Penelope’s number one priority was making sure Josie stayed alive long enough for them to be safe and happy together.

 

 

The closer they got to the twins’ birthday, the more worried Josie became, but also the more relieved. Soon, the hurt would be over, and the ones left behind would have to pick up the pieces for the ones who had gone. It was already an unstable and uncertain situation, and when you add a new and evidently dangerous vampire on the loose to the equation, the balance tips, and suddenly things became even more complicated.

 

 

Josie had a lot on her mind these days, but today of all days she hoped would be different.

 

 

Sitting up, she looked around for any sign of Penelope, expecting to find the usual note or message or clue she’d left behind as to where she might have gone; but today there was nothing there.

 

 

_She forgot._

 

Josie tried not to be disappointed; she really did. In the grand scheme of things, with everything they were dealing with, with less than a month before the merge, she knew it wasn’t fair of her to feel this way; but she just couldn’t help it. Waking up in Penelope’s arms was the only thing that made her feel like maybe – just maybe – everything would be okay. She needed that feeling more than anything else these days.

 

 

Reaching for the nearest item of clothing she could find – which, in this case, _happened_ to be one of her favorite graphic tees of Penelope’s that she only ever wore in private – she got dressed and headed to the library, hoping to find Penelope there and trying to put on her best nothing-is-wrong face (and probably failing miserably).

 

 

Thankfully, it was a Saturday morning, so the campus was relatively empty, and she didn’t have to worry about anyone stopping her to ask questions. She guessed most of the students would’ve either gone back home to see their parents for the weekend or decided to sleep in for the day. Either way, she wasn’t complaining. She preferred the quiet a lot more than the usual alternative.

 

 

Pushing her way past the library doors, expecting to find it mostly empty, she was surprised to find it was actually _completely_ empty. She supposed not many students had the motivation required to wake up on a Saturday and head to the library.

 

 

Josie raised her voice a little, just in case Penelope had dozed off behind one of the library’s bookshelves, like she sometimes did when she hadn’t slept well the night before, “Penelope?”

 

 

When no response came, she headed to the spot at the back of the library where she would usually look for Penelope when she wasn’t answering her phone and find her drowning under a pile of books. Except Penelope wasn’t there either.

 

 

“Josie?”

 

 

“Hope? What are you doing here?”

 

 

Hope shrugged, looking as nonchalant as ever, “I’m a bit behind on my readings. Thought I’d catch up.”

 

 

The skepticism was evident in Josie’s voice. Something was definitely up, “On a Saturday morning?”

 

 

“Well, _excuse_ me. Some of us actually care about our education.”

 

 

She knew there was no accusation behind Hope’s words, or at least that she didn’t mean for there to be, but they caught Josie off guard nonetheless and made her wince as soon as they left Hope’s mouth.

 

 

“Josie… I didn’t mean it like that.”

 

 

“No, I know. Don’t worry about it. I should go.”

 

 

Josie walked away from Hope after that. As much as she was hurt by the words, what she really felt bad about was how on-the-nose they were. A part of her did care, but she just didn’t think it mattered that much anymore.

 

 

She only stopped in her tracks when she remembered Hope might know where Penelope was. “Actually, have you seen Pen-”

 

 

Josie barely had time to turn around and finish her sentence before she felt her eyelids drop and her knees give out. It was the most tired she had felt in a while, but also the most relaxed. Her body never even hit the ground because she didn’t feel the pain that came after a fall. She felt like she’d been floating for hours; weightless, without a care in the world.

 

 

When she fell into her body again, the familiar feeling of being in the passenger seat of a car made panic shoot through her. She wasn’t used to feeling out of control, and for all she knew, she could have been gone for hours with no memory of what happened to her.

 

 

It was only when she opened her eyes slightly, looked over to the driver’s seat, and found Penelope sitting there that she let herself relax again.

 

 

“Penelope? What happened? Where are we?”

 

 

“Morning, sleepyhead. You’ll see soon enough. Go back to sleep; we’re almost there.”

 

 

Josie was still fighting to stay awake. The events of that morning were slowly starting to come back to her, but the effects of the spell hadn’t completely worn off yet. She fell asleep again shortly after.

 

 

“Hey Jojo, we’re here.”

 

 

Regaining consciousness slowly, eyes adjusting to the light, she looked up to find Penelope staring down at her from the now-open passenger-side door.

 

 

“Jojo… baby, wake up.”

 

 

Josie felt her girlfriend’s hand on her cheek, and instinctively relaxed her head into her palm; eyes fluttering open and shut as they struggled to zero in on Penelope.

 

 

“The spell must have hit you pretty hard, huh? How do you feel?”

 

 

“Like I’ve been asleep for years… how long have I been out?”

 

 

Penelope smiled down at her, eyes softening, “Give or take a few hours. Come here; I’ve got you.”

 

 

She lifted her arm, wrapping it around Penelope’s neck, and felt the girl’s arm snake itself under her knees, while the other wrapped around her back. Suddenly she was in Penelope’s arms and they were outside, in the middle of nowhere.

 

 

“Where are we?”

 

 

“Well, when I was in the library a while back, I found this book. It spoke about hidden magical spots in the States, places witches had hidden away to keep safe from people who would destroy them. Humans, vampires, werewolves… even other witches. Each coven had a spot they marked as their own. These were the places they went to hide when they knew danger was coming.”

 

 

“Is that what the clearing near Salvatore was? A coven’s hiding place?”

 

 

“Exactly.”

 

 

“Did... did you find your coven’s?”

 

 

“No… there was no mention of them. I looked but I couldn’t find anything.”

 

 

Josie moved one of the hands she had wrapped around Penelope’s neck and placed it on her chest, over her heart, “Penny…”

 

 

“It’s okay. Besides, we’re not here for me. We’re here for you.”

 

 

“What do you mean?”

 

 

“This was the Gemini coven’s spot.”

 

 

If Josie was still groggy from the spell before, she was definitely wide awake now. She looked around, eyebrows furrowed and mouth ajar, and tried to imagine what it must have been like years ago. A part of her felt ashamed to even be here, knowing what her coven’s actions had put Penelope and hers through; but another part of her felt safe, like as soon as they crossed the cloaking spell, an overwhelming feeling of relief washed over her.   

 

 

“I know you’ve always wondered what they were like, Jo… your family. As much as you tried to avoid talking about it for my sake, I thought you deserved to see it.”

 

 

“Penelope... It’s beautiful.”

 

 

Penelope set her down a distance away from the car. The spot was on the edge of a hill overlooking a canyon, the most beautiful sight Josie had ever seen. She heard the sound of Penelope’s steps fading away from her and turned around to ask where she was going.

 

 

“Just… trust me.”

 

 

Josie watched as Penelope turned the car around and drove it in reverse until it was as close to the hill as possible but within a safe enough distance from the edge. When she got out of the car and moved to open the trunk, Josie felt a rush of warmth flood through her.

 

 

“You remembered.”

 

 

Penelope gazed at her, looking both surprised and slightly hurt to know that Josie had thought for one second that she could have forgotten, “Of course I did.”

 

 

Reaching her hand out, Penelope brushed the loose strand of hair that had fallen onto Josie’s face to the side, “Happy anniversary, Jojo.”

 

 

She had recreated their first “official” date and made it better. A blanket was spread out on the floor of the car's trunk, a picnic basket was tucked to the side, flower petals were spread out everywhere, and fairy lights were hanging around the inside of the car.

 

 

Josie didn’t realize that she was on the verge of tearing up until she felt warm arms wrap around her. Resting her head in the space connecting Penelope’s shoulder blade to her neck, Josie felt a hand stroking her hair; the other wrapped around her waist.

 

 

“Hey… Come on, no crying. This is a happy day… even though I  _did_ have Hope knock you out for the first half of it.”

 

 

Only Penelope Park could make Josie laugh when all she wanted to do was cry.

 

 

“I still can’t believe you did that. How did she even know where to find me?”

 

 

“Because I knew that’s the first place you’d go to look for me.”

 

 

A look of discomfort flashed across Josie’s face, but she was quick to hide it. “Well, you did forget one thing…”

 

 

Penelope looked around for a moment, confusion painted over her features until a smile made its way onto her face, “No, I didn’t… I just remembered something better.”

 

 

Josie turned her eyes from the smirk on Penelope’s face to look over at the canyon. It was getting dark out, but you couldn’t miss it even if you tried.

 

 

It was snowing.

 

 

Josie remembered the last time she had seen the snow; the only time she ever did. It was the night she’d told Penelope about the letters her mom had left them, and how much she used to love the snow. Josie had also told Penelope that that was another thing she and her mom had in common. So, Penelope did the one thing that could have made Josie fall even deeper in love with her. She made it snow. That was the day that Josie realized there was no going back for her. She had never thought it was possible to be this in love with another human being until she met Penelope Park.

 

 

She looked up as the snow started falling and covering everything around them. When she looked down again, it had covered Penelope’s hair, and some flecks had even fallen onto her eyelashes.

 

 

She didn’t think anything she could say could make Penelope understand how much all of this meant to her. Not only did she remember that today was their anniversary, but she went through all of the trouble to drive them out here and recreate one of Josie's favorite days, somehow making it even better; even with everything they had going on in their lives at the moment.

 

 

Josie reached forward and kissed Penelope, one for the ages; slow and steady like they had all of the time in the world. When she couldn’t take it anymore, Penelope led them to the back of the car and laid Josie down on the blanket gently. Their kisses grew more and more intense as time passed, hands hungry and desperate to rid each other of the clothes separating them.

 

 

After a while, Penelope sat back, straddling Josie. Her hair was messy, and her lips were slightly bruised. She pulled off her sweater, ran her hand through her hair, and stopped to look down at Josie, “You’re wearing my shirt.”

 

 

Josie responded without hesitation, and without breaking eye contact, a warm blush rising to her cheeks, “Yeah… it smelled like you.”

 

 

Penelope smiled at her, and bent down to kiss her again, and again, and again, until about an hour later when they were lying on their sides, facing each other, hands touching, and Penelope was the one who broke the comfortable silence that had fallen between them.

 

 

“Every time I think about how much I love you, my heart just…” She didn’t finish her sentence; she just raised her fist up and closed it tightly instead.

 

 

“Is that bad?”

 

 

“No, because every time I remember you love me too, it just…” Josie watched, mesmerized, as Penelope released all of the tension in her fist and spread her fingers slowly.

 

 

Josie smiled, “You’re such a dork.”

 

 

“Well, you’re with me so… who’s the real dork here?”

 

 

Both of their laughter was quickly interrupted by the sound of Josie’s phone ringing. When she picked it up to see who it was, she felt Penelope’s body stiffen next to her.

 

 

“I don’t have to answer.”

 

 

“She’s your mom, Jo. Just answer.”

 

 

She swiped her finger across the screen and put the phone to her ear hesitantly, all the while searching Penelope’s face for any sign of discomfort, “Hey mom… yeah, I’m fine; we both are… I miss you too…”

 

 

She watched as Penelope broke eye contact and sat up, pulling her shirt back over her head.

 

 

“… listen, mom, now’s not really a good time… can I call you later?... sure, I’ll let her know.”

 

 

“Everything okay?”

 

 

“She wanted to check in on you.”

 

 

Confusion flashed across Penelope’s face, “On me? Why?”

 

 

“She just wants to make sure you’re dealing okay.”

 

 

And then a look of realization appeared in her eyes, “You mean she feels guilty.”

 

 

“Penelope-”

 

 

“We should head back. We’re meeting the girls for drinks tonight. They want us to celebrate together.”

 

 

The drive back to town was quiet; painfully quiet. Josie didn’t know what to say and it was clear to her that Penelope didn’t want to say anything. By the time they made it to the bar, it was late and not many people were around; which was relatively unusual for a Saturday night.

 

 

Walking inside, Penelope was still avoiding eye contact with her. When they saw Davina and Hope sitting at a table to the back, they made their way over quietly, and Josie was the one who greeted them.

 

 

“Hello to you too, lovebirds.”

 

 

Hope had a beer in her hand, minus a few empty ones on the table, and Davina was clearly not drinking; probably wanting to ensure they all had a ride back to campus.

 

 

“Where’s Lizzie?”

 

 

Davina was the one who answered, while Hope’s eyes looked in every direction other than Lizzie’s. Josie wasn’t sure what to make of it anymore, “She’s been talking up that girl at the bar for a while now. If I didn’t know any better, I would have thought she was actually flirting with her.”

 

 

Hope sat up then, “I need to go to the bathroom.”

 

 

“I’ll come with you.” And Penelope followed.

 

 

Davina must’ve seen the look of defeat on Josie’s face as her eyes followed Penelope’s retreating form, “Everything okay with you two?”

 

 

“Yeah, we just had a moment.”

 

 

Her daze was interrupted by the sound of her twin’s voice, “Guys, I want you to meet someone. This is my twin sister, Josie, and this is our friend, Davina.”

 

 

“Davina.”

 

 

Josie watched the interaction unfold, and saw uncertainty in Davina’s eyes at the sound of the girl saying her name.

 

 

“I’m sorry… have we met before?”

 

 

When Josie looked back at the girl again, she saw the fleeting look of guilt on her face. She knew that look all too well by now. She knew who this was. “It's you... You’re the vampire from the party…”

 

 

Much to Josie’s surprise, the raven-haired girl didn’t try to deny or hide it, but she was still only looking at Davina, “My name’s Izzie. I’m sorry about that night. I just moved here… not sure where to get blood bags yet...”

 

 

“You think that’s an excuse? You could’ve killed her!”

 

 

When Davina finally spoke, it wasn’t what Josie was expecting to hear, “Josie, I’m fine.”

 

 

It was only then that Izzie looked over at Josie, addressing her earlier question, “It’s not, really; but I wouldn’t have. I know how to control it.”

 

 

Looking over at Davina again, Josie thought she sensed Izzie's voice soften just a little, “For what it’s worth, I didn’t mean to hurt you. I actually really liked talking to you, but old habits die hard, I guess. Anyway, I should go. I don’t want to ruin the rest of your night.”

 

 

“Hold on a second! Do you really think we’re going to let you go? Just like that? After you hurt our friend?”

 

 

“Josie, I said I was fine!”

 

 

She had never heard Davina raise her voice like that before, so she conceded, and let go of her grip on Izzie’s arm. Less than ten seconds later, Hope and Penelope were back, and they sensed the newly-formed tension on the table. It was Penelope who reacted first, “Who was that?”

 

 

“The vampire from the party. She said she just moved here, and she had the audacity to say that she didn’t mean to hurt Dav-”

 

 

“Damnit, Josie! I said I was fine. Can we just drop it?”

 

 

Josie watched, stunned, as Davina picked up her things and stormed out. Lizzie and Hope gave her a look of empathy but ultimately followed Davina out. She was left standing alone with Penelope, who was looking at her again, thankfully, except it wasn’t a look she was used to getting. This look screamed disappointment.

 

 

And for the first time that day, Josie wanted to go back to sleep more than anything else in the world.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry. Angst will be heavy going forward (we gotta walk through the darkness to reach the light). Please share your feedback on this chapter in the comments, or tweet me @voidpen, or send me a message on curiouscat.me/voidpen. Basically, just talk to me plstxbye. 💘


	3. -25 days

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just a shit-ton of angst.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Get ready to fall in love Izzie.

“Are you just going to ignore me forever?”

 

 

“I’m not ignoring you.”

 

 

“Penelope, we both know I know you better than that. You haven’t said two words to me since we got back to town. You’ve barely even looked at me.”

 

 

Penelope felt the bed shift slightly. It was past midnight by the time they had gotten back to their room, and she had tried her best to dodge Josie’s attempts to get her to open up. She was hoping she wouldn’t have to talk about it tonight, but she would have been lying if she said she wasn’t expecting Josie to confront her about it as soon as they were alone.

 

 

She was sitting on her side of the bed, still in her day clothes, unbuttoning her shirt and getting ready to call it a night, when Josie finally cracked and asked her that first question. Penelope tried her best not to turn around and look at her, dreading what she might find on the girl’s face. Worry had become such a predominant emotion in their lives that she had gotten used to it by now. But it killed her every time she saw it in Josie’s eyes, even more so when she was the cause of it.

 

 

“You messed up, Josie.”

 

 

“Why? Because I answered my mom’s call when you explicitly told me to?”

 

 

This was exactly what Penelope was trying to avoid. It had become a pattern for them. Penelope would get bothered by something; something that was, more often than not, completely outside of Josie’s control, and Josie would automatically feel like it was her fault. The thing is, Penelope used to pride herself on how well she used to be able to mask the way she felt. But lately, it seemed as though her emotions oozed out of her freely, with no consideration as to how the people around her might react to them.

 

But tonight, Josie was right. Penelope _was_ upset. She knew very well what the trigger was; it was obvious to anyone who knew the truth of their past, and how their lives were connected long before they’d even met. As hard as she tried, she couldn’t move on from what Josie’s mom had done to her and her family. Every time Caroline called Josie, or texted her, or came to visit, this unbridled sense of rage would envelop and ultimately suffocate Penelope; which is why she tried to avoid it whenever she could. It also didn’t help that the way she felt about Caroline had put a strain on Josie’s relationship with her mom, or that the guilt that Caroline had built up towards her had only intensified with time, eventually leading to her false sense of worry towards Penelope.

 

 

But as much as Caroline seemed to care nowadays, any person in their right mind could tell you that she was only just biding her time. A good mother would do anything to protect her kids, and as much as it killed Penelope to admit, Caroline was a great mother. She couldn’t really hold it against her, either. Josie’s life was on the line and Penelope herself was prepared to do whatever it took to save it. She supposed that was the one thing she and Caroline had in common; the only thing that mattered, anyway.

 

 

Penelope had tried so hard, for the past three years, to keep from associating the trauma Caroline had caused her to her relationship with Josie. But every time she was around the girl, and she thought of Caroline, she also thought of her parents, and her little brother. The only saving grace to this, the one thing keeping her sane, was knowing that she had the power to see them again.

 

 

Her ability to communicate with those beyond the veil had only grown stronger, and more refined. She was able to appear to people she had a strong connection with, without having to wait for them to find her; and sometimes, if she concentrated hard enough, she could even touch them. On some nights, when she wasn’t drowning herself in research, going through volume after volume of books on witchcraft and dark magic, she would visit them, and she would feel a sense of peace again.

 

 

Her family had conflicting opinions when it came to her relationship with Josie. She had found out that everything they had put her through growing up, they had done to try and keep her and her little brother safe. And Josie was a threat to that very safety they had lost their lives trying to sustain. Her mother was sympathetic to her plight; she understood what Josie meant to Penelope, and the love that bound them together. But her father was a different story. It had taken him a long time to open up to the idea of her and Josie being together, and he still didn’t completely approve. It was a small mercy they offered her, keeping her little brother in the dark about all of it. She supposed it also helped –knowing that he would be alright no matter what happened. If they won, he would still be able to see her as often as he liked. If they lost, well, then they would be together again.

 

 

All of this was playing on a constant loop in the back of Penelope’s mind. Her love for Josie, and her fear of losing her; her hatred towards Caroline, and her guilt for what it had done to Josie.

 

 

But she couldn’t say any of this out loud, so she did what she did best these days. She deflected.  
  


 

“That’s not what this is about.”

 

 

Josie shifted again, and she heard the familiar and formerly comforting sound of wood squeaking on their bed frame. Josie was closer now, and Penelope felt the girl’s hand tentatively touch her arm.

 

 

“Then what is it about? Please, just talk to me.”

 

 

“You didn’t have to treat Izzie like that.”

 

 

It was the only thing she could think to say that Josie might have believed and judging by how fast her hand left Penelope’s arm, it had worked.

 

 

“What?”

 

 

“You can’t just talk to people like that, Josie. You don’t know anything about that girl, and even after Davina told you to stop, you just kept going.”

 

 

“Are you serious? She’s a vampire. How did you expect me to react?”

 

 

“Being a vampire doesn’t automatically make you a bad person.”

 

 

“Doesn’t it, though?”

 

 

Penelope could hear the frustration in Josie’s voice, clear enough to know that she wasn’t thinking properly. She obviously didn’t hear the implication behind Penelope’s words.

 

 

“Josie, your mom’s a vampire.”

 

 

The words left her mouth before she had the chance to think them over, but she didn’t regret them. To Penelope, Caroline wasn’t a bad person because she was a vampire. In the end, the choices you make are your own, no matter what you are.

 

 

But judging by the anger in Josie’s voice, she still hadn’t caught on, “My mom didn’t feed on my friend, Penelope!”

 

 

She couldn’t take it anymore. She turned to look at Josie, and she didn’t have to raise her voice for the girl to feel her pain, “No, you’re right. She did much worse, didn’t she?”

 

 

Based on the look of shock on Josie’s face, she was clearly caught off guard, both by Penelope’s sudden movement, and by what she had said.

 

 

Penelope thought Josie might actually cry, and this was exactly what she was constantly trying to avoid. Hurting the person you love most in the world because you’re not strong enough to control your emotions was the most cowardly thing you could do. She felt sick.

 

 

“Penelope, I’m so sorry… I wasn’t thinking, I-”

 

 

Josie’s fingertips grazed her back lightly, but Penelope stood up before she could come any closer. In the state that she was in right now, she knew physical contact would wreck her.

 

 

She hated what she was doing to Josie, because Josie didn’t deserve to feel this way, but Penelope was way too exhausted to tell her that.

 

 

“I need some air.”

 

 

She was out of the room before she could hear the crack in Josie’s voice as she called to her, begging her not leave; before she could see the tears gathering in her eyes. Penelope didn’t have anywhere to go, and she wasn’t exactly thinking properly, so she just let her steps guide her; and when she ended up pushing her way past the library doors, she felt a small sense of relief. This was familiar. This was quiet. This was safe. She didn’t have to feel ashamed here. She could just be alone for a little while.

 

 

“Excuse me, miss? I don't have a library card, but do you mind if I check you out?”

 

 

Penelope was snapped out of her trance by the semi-distant sound of a girl’s voice. Looking around, she quickly found the source, “You.”

 

 

Izzie was sitting on the railing of the library’s second floor. Her legs were dangling down, she had a smirk on her face, and a book in her lap. Penelope was about to ask her to come down from there, to be careful, but she caught herself in time and remembered it didn’t matter. She was a vampire, after all.

 

 

“Me.”

 

 

“What are you doing here?”

 

 

Her tone was light, playful, a complete 180 to the way she had sounded just a few hours earlier, “I go here, remember?”

 

 

“No, I meant what are you doing _here_ , in the library at… 1:14AM?”

 

 

“Just doing some light reading.”

 

 

“Right…”

 

 

Penelope wasn’t sure what else there was to say, so she lowered her head and walked forward, eager to reach her favorite reading spot in the library and distract herself with a book.

 

 

“What about you?”

 

 

The ease and speed with which Izzie was at her side made Penelope’s heart rate pick up. Part of her was unfazed. She had been around her fair share of vampires to know that she could defend herself if it ever came to that. But another part of her was telling her to be careful, and she knew that part came from Josie.

 

 

“What about me?”

 

 

“What are you doing here?”

 

 

She kept walking, doing her best to act as indifferent as possible, “I just needed some air.”

 

 

The light chuckle she received in return caught her off-guard, “And you went to a stuffy old library?”

 

 

“There are worse places to be.”

 

 

Her mind kept going back to Josie, all alone in their bed, probably wracking her brain trying to pinpoint the exact moment Penelope had given up on her.

 

 

“Ah, yes. Trouble in paradise?”

 

 

“You wouldn’t get it.”

 

 

“Try me.”

 

 

Izzie had stopped walking, and when Penelope felt cold fingers on her hand, she did too. She barely had time to look down before she felt Izzie let go.

 

 

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that.”

 

 

The girl was clearly flustered, which made Penelope think that she hadn’t meant to startle her.

 

 

She ran her fingers through her hair and let out a breath, “You really want to know?”

 

 

Izzie nodded, and Penelope didn’t think things could get any worse, so she threw caution to the wind.

 

 

“Three years ago, I found out my girlfriend’s mom killed my family because my coven put a curse on her daughters decades ago. And then, my dead father came to me and told me that the only way to break said curse is for the last of our coven to die. I’m the last one, meaning the only way to break the curse and save the girl I love, is for me to die.”

 

 

The vampire was quiet for so long that Penelope thought she wasn’t going to respond, so she left her standing there and continued walking until she reached the back of the library. She only got a response when she lowered herself to the ground and leaned her back against one of the bookshelves.

 

 

“But you’re still here.”

 

 

Looking up, she found Izzie staring down at her, a frown on her face.

 

 

“But… I’m still here.”

 

 

Izzie pointed to the spot on the ground in front of Penelope, evidently asking for permission to join her.

 

 

Penelope nodded, stretching her legs out in front of her.

 

 

When Izzie sat down across from her, she pulled her legs up close to her chest and rested her chin on her knees, “I imagine your girlfriend had something to do with that.”

 

 

“ _Believe me_ , if Josie wasn’t in the picture, things would have gone very differently.”

 

 

“Wow, folks, she’s scary… wouldn’t have pegged you for the type to have a dark side.”

 

 

For the first time that night, Penelope smiled; a small smile, but a genuine one nonetheless, “What? You mean the tattoo on my neck and my general aura of despair didn’t give it away?”

 

 

“Appearances can be deceiving. I try not to judge because I don’t want to misunderstand.”

 

 

“Is that what you are, then? A misunderstanding?”

 

 

Izzie’s broody tone was quickly replaced by her initial playful one, “I like to think I’m lost in translation,” and Penelope was fighting the smile trying to sneak its way onto her face.

 

 

“And she smiles too? I didn’t know you had it in you.”

 

 

Penelope rolled her eyes, smile widening, and nudged Izzie’s foot with her own, “Shut up… I shouldn’t even be talking to you.”

 

 

“Because of your girlfriend?”

 

 

Penelope was silent for a moment. She knew the last thing she wanted to do was talk about what had just happened between her and Josie. She felt guilty enough as it was, and she didn’t need someone else reminding her of how badly she had messed things up.

 

 

_Deflect._

 

 

“So, what’s the deal with you and Davina, anyway? What happened that night?”

 

 

“Well, I never could resist a pretty face.”

 

 

Those few words were enough for Penelope to realize that this was a mistake. Without uttering another word, she pulled herself up to her feet and turned to leave, only stopping when she heard Izzie’s voice again, “Wait.”

 

 

The girl didn’t try to physically hold her back this time, but the softness in her voice made Penelope turn back to look at her all the same.

 

 

“She just reminded me of what I’m trying to run away from.”

 

 

“And what’s that?”

 

 

“Who I used to be.”

 

 

Penelope sat back down, this time next to Izzie, and nodded in her direction, “I’m listening.”

 

 

Slightly taken aback by the sudden change of events, Izzie turned her eyes away from Penelope, zeroing in on nothing and everything at the same time, and began recounting her story.

 

 

“I don’t remember much of my life before I became a vampire. My mom left me outside of a hospital the day I was born, and I don’t know much about her or my dad… but I know enough to know they weren’t fit to raise a kid. I was placed in an orphanage before I even knew what it meant, and I stayed there for a long time; until one day, a couple came to visit. They saw me and they said I looked like their daughter. They said they’d lost her in a fire when she was just 17. They adopted me, took me in, and paid for me to get the best education possible. They were wealthy, cultured, well-traveled. They were kind, sometimes, but they could also be cruel, and cold, and spiteful. Eventually, they showed me the truth of what they really were. I had just turned 17, the age their daughter was when she died, and they didn’t want that to change, so, they gave me a choice. I could either let them turn me, or I’d be out on the streets. It wasn’t a hard decision, really. I didn’t want to be alone again. So they turned me, and little by little, they taught me what I needed to know to survive. The problem was, over time, they lost what kindness they had left. They were just cruel. You can imagine what being in an environment like that does to someone, especially when you have no one else in the world. You either adapt or… you’re left behind. I knew there was no place for the weak in that house, so I tried to make myself strong…”

 

 

“You became like them.”

 

 

Izzie nodded slowly. Her eyes were out of focus, and she was clearly lost in her memories, so Penelope tried to stay as still and silent as she could.

 

 

“I guess I just really wanted them to be proud of me, for once. I couldn’t see what it was actually doing to me until one day, I met this girl. We went to different schools, but I saw her crying on the side of the road one morning and something in me just… snapped. She’d grazed her bike against the sidewalk and lost control… I just wanted to make sure she was okay, but I was still a new vampire then. She saw the way my eyes changed when I smelled the blood, and I would’ve compelled her but… she wasn’t scared of me. We kept seeing each other after that. I told her about my parents, about how I tried to be more like them because I was afraid to be alone again, and she promised I wouldn’t be; she said I’d never be alone ever again. She thought I was better than my parents, and I believed her. She was smart, and kind, and beautiful; she was so beautiful… Eventually, we fell in love. I never told my parents about her, of course. They would never allow their only daughter to be…”

 

 

She could tell Izzie was trying hard not to let herself show weakness. Her gaze never wavered, and she didn’t move a muscle, but Penelope could tell this part of the story was particularly hard for her to share, so she did the only thing she could think to do. She took Izzie’s hand and gently coaxed her forward, “Then what happened?”

 

 

“We were going to run away together. Everything was going according to plan until I got home one night and saw her standing outside my balcony. I tried calling to her, but she couldn’t hear me. She wasn’t moving, and then I heard my dad’s voice… He said, “this is what happens when you fall for the wrong type of person.” That’s when I understood. He’d compelled her to take her own life, and I wasn’t fast enough to stop it. I couldn’t save her.”

 

 

“What did you do?”

 

 

“I ran away… and I’ve been on the run since.”

 

 

“Is that why you came here? You’re still running from them?”

 

 

Izzie nodded again, still avoiding eye contact, still holding Penelope’s hand.

 

 

“I don’t know what to say. I’m so sorry.”

 

 

“Me too.”

 

 

“Can I ask you a question?”

 

 

“Sure.”

 

 

“Why did you feed on Davina? After everything you’ve been through… you said you were trying to be better.”

 

 

“I was starving, I- I didn’t want to… I just-”

 

 

“What?”

 

 

“I was trying to be kind.”

 

 

“I’m not exactly sure that’s kindness.”

 

 

“I’m not either, but there was a time when I wouldn’t have stopped myself, and I was going to that night. And I know it’s hard to understand, but compelling Davina’s pain away was the most human I’d felt in a long time.”

 

 

“That’s not good enough.”

 

 

“I know. It’s just… easier, falling back into old patterns; especially when there’s no one left to help you get better.”

 

 

“Just because something’s easy _,_ doesn’t mean it’s right, though.”

 

 

Izzie smiled then, lowering her head, “You remind me of her, you know. She had this clear vision of what right and wrong looked like, but when I explained to her the truth about what I was, when I told her about the things I’d done, I expected her to run away; but she didn’t. She stayed, and she listened. She looked at me the same way you’re looking at me right now. The look that said, “I see you; I hear you, but I expect better from you”. She made me want to be a better person.”

 

 

“You shouldn’t be better because someone wants you to be, Izzie. You should be better because you want to be.”

 

 

“I’m trying.”

 

 

“Good.”

 

 

Penelope wasn’t expecting any of this to happen, especially not tonight. But as much as it pained her to hear Izzie’s story, to know the truth about where she had come from; she was glad that she did.

 

 

She felt like time had gotten away from them, though, and she remembered Josie and everything that had happened prior to the past hour, so she stood up and turned to leave, stopping a short distance away from Izzie, but still not turning around to look at her, “Hey, Izzie?”

 

 

“Yeah?”

 

 

“You’re not as bad as you think are.”

 

 

Turning her head to the side, she threw one last look at the girl, and saw that she was smiling; a genuine smile, the kind that makes your heart ache if you let it.

 

 

Penelope was about halfway to the library’s exit when she remembered what she had wanted to say earlier, but didn’t get the chance to, “The lame pickup lines have to go, though! Sorry, I don’t make the rules!”

 

 

She wasn’t close enough to see the girl anymore, but Penelope knew that she was smiling; and that small realization made her smile, too.    

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please let me know what you thought of this chapter [& Izzie]! I'll be lurking over on my Twitter @voidpen, but please feel free to leave me your comments on here as well. I absolutely love reading all of them, even if I don't always reply [there's just a lot]. They make up 60% of my motivation to keep writing. 💘


	4. -23 days

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Josie's worst nightmare.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PSA: this story is very angsty and very sad so please, just be careful when you're reading. I never want to make anyone feel stressed or anxious. Please take care of yourself. 💘

Two days had passed since Josie had last seen Penelope. If they hadn’t had a falling out, she would have been worried sick by now. Actually, if she was being completely honest with herself, she would admit that she was, in fact, extremely worried; but it was a small mercy that she at least knew where Penelope was. Hope had texted her the night of their fight to tell her that Penelope was going to crash in her room. A part of her was relieved to know Penelope was somewhere safe and that she had someone to take care of her, especially when she was too stubborn to take care of herself sometimes. But another part of her was scared, worried that time apart would do them more harm than good. She had hoped things would settle down the next day, or that she would be able to talk it out with Penelope to try and fix it, but Penelope wasn’t answering any of her texts, and the last thing she wanted to do was overwhelm her. To make matters even worse, Josie had found out that Penelope was spending more and more time with Izzie. In fact, according to Hope, the two were getting along very well for two people who had technically only just met.

 

The pit in Josie’s stomach was only getting deeper and deeper at this point. She knew a storm was coming and she was the only one who was able to see it. Not that she wasn’t aware that everyone was on edge because they were running out of time – she was. She knew Lizzie was trying to live in the moment, having fun and keeping things light and carefree. She also knew this was her way of disconnecting from the world. Finding Hope without a drink in her hand these days was almost impossible, which was understandable considering the fact that she was inevitably going to lose someone she loved no matter what happened.

  

But Penelope was the one Josie was worried about the most. The looming threat of the merge had taken its toll on all of them, driving each of them to self-destruct in their own way, but Josie knew Penelope was the one who was suffering most because of it, because she felt guilty for it; as if she believed it was all her fault from the beginning.

 

And it wasn’t enough that their future was uncertain and unguaranteed; their past was haunting them as well. Learning that Caroline had been the one to strip Penelope of the only family she had left in the world made Josie’s skin crawl. She knew her mom would do anything to protect her and Lizzie, but Josie had never stopped to consider she would go to such horrifying lengths to do it. And she could tell Penelope was trying her best to move on, but she saw it in her eyes every time Caroline called or texted, or somebody mentioned her name. It had been three years and the wound still hadn’t fully healed, and if Josie was completely honest with herself, she never expected it to.

 

Her train of thought was interrupted by the sound of books being closed and chairs screeching as their inhabitants left them behind in a haste to get to their next class. She hadn’t been paying attention in her classes lately, and she couldn’t even bring herself to care. All of these people with their whole lives ahead of them, constantly taking them for granted; never once stopping to think about how good they have it.

 

She felt the familiar sinking feeling of impending doom washing over her. Lately, it had been taking everything in her to just get up in the morning. Her thoughts were haunting her wherever she went, and the only asylum she could think of was Penelope.

 

It was always Penelope.

 

“Josie? Are you okay?”

  

Her eyes shot up to meet Davina’s. The witch was staring at her expectantly, with the usual perpetual tinge of sadness in eyes.

 

“Dav, hey. Yeah, I’m fine.”

  

Davina looked at her uncertainly, almost as if she didn’t believe her, “Listen… I wanted to apologize for snapping at you at the bar the other night. I know you were just trying to help.”

 

“I’m sorry, too. I never meant to make you feel uncomfortable. I guess I’m just overprotective of you because of everything you’ve done for us.”

 

“Josie, I _literally_ haven’t done anything. I’ve been here for months, and nothing’s changed. We were supposed to have found a way by now.”

 

“I know, but you’re here, and you’re trying. That’s more than enough.”

 

Davina smiled down at her, the warm smile of a kind heart. It made Josie feel significantly less anxious than she’d been feeling lately. There was no pain behind that smile, no pity or fear. Davina was just a genuine person who helped in the most minuscule of ways, but it made all of the difference in the world.

 

Josie moved to gather her things as quickly as she could to leave the classroom before the next batch of students swarmed in.

 

“Are you meeting up with Penelope?”

 

“Um, no. I was actually just going to head to my room for a bit…”

 

She could see the disappointment on Davina’s face, which urged her forward, “… We kind of got into a fight that night. We haven’t spoken since.”

  

“Well, I think she’s at the library. I was actually heading there now, why don’t come with me?”

  

“I don’t know if that’s a good idea, Dav. I’ve just been trying to give her some space.”

 

“Do you really think space is what Penelope needs right now?”

  

“I don’t know…” And Josie was telling the truth. She had no idea what Penelope needed. She didn't know if Penelope was still mad at her, or if she was waiting for her to apologize, or if she just wanted to be left alone. It made Josie even more anxious because she didn’t know how to fix any of it.

  

“She’s just scared, Jo. She’s dealing the best she can on her own, but she still needs you. Neither one of you can do this alone. You need each other, and you can’t afford to be apart…” 

 

Davina stopped walking suddenly, hand on Josie’s shoulder, inching closer so she could hear her better in the crowded hallway, “… Listen, trust me when I say this, the people you love aren’t going to be around forever. The future is so uncertain – for everyone – that you have to make the most of the time you have with the people you love while you’re all still here.”

 

Maybe Josie felt too indebted to Davina for no valid reason. Maybe it was true that her being there hadn’t helped as much as they were all hoping it would in terms of finding the loophole, but to Josie, Davina had helped a lot more than she knew; because just knowing she was there made Josie feel significantly less alone. And when Josie let herself think about it, Davina was the only person she didn’t have to worry about because no matter what happened, she knew Davina would be alright in the end. After all, she had survived much worse. They were walking again when Josie felt the incessant urge to ask her about it, “How did you do it?”

 

“Do what?”

 

“How did you get over Kol?”

 

Davina let out a shaky breath, letting her eyes fall to her feet as she continued to move forward. Uncomfortable silence was deafening to someone like Josie and so, sensing that she had overstepped, she tried her best to make up for it as quickly as she could, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to pry, I-”

  

“No, it’s okay… Honestly? I’m not really sure I have; not entirely, anyway. He was my first love, and he’ll always have a special place in my heart, but he’s gone now, and I know he’d want me to be happy, so, I’m trying my best. The world moves on, and you just have to be strong enough to move on with it.”

  

Knowing Davina gave Josie hope. This girl had known the worst kind of loss imaginable, and she was constantly fighting to overcome it. She lost the love of her life, and she survived. It gave Josie hope that maybe Penelope could, too.

 

“Why do you ask?”

 

“No reason… just curious, I guess.”

 

The halls were crowded, and the loud voices bounced off the walls. Every time she walked through the campus, Josie hoped the noise would drown out her own thoughts, that the overwhelming sound of laughter she heard emanating from everyone around her would somehow cancel out the sorrow she felt inside of her. But she was never so lucky, and the voice in her head that told her she couldn’t run away from her problems became louder, and louder, and louder; that by the time she and Davina had reached the library, she was already exhausted.

 

Josie hoped with her whole heart that Penelope would be behind those doors; that she would find her sitting in her usual spot, head buried underneath a pile of old books, trying to suck up as much information as she could. She pictured the exact moment that she would walk in, and Penelope would raise her head and greet her with a smile; the smile that was reversed only for Josie, the smile that said: “There you are, I’ve been looking for you.”

 

But she didn’t. In fact, when Josie pushed her way past the heavy library doors, she found the exact opposite of what she was hoping to find.

 

Penelope was smiling, but Penelope was smiling at someone else.

 

She felt the ghost of a hand hovering over her arm, aware that Davina had also seen what was happening in front of them, but for the life of her, Josie just couldn’t look away.

  

They stood there for about ten seconds before Izzie spotted them, a smile painted on her face and laughter still in her throat. When her gaze lingered on Josie, Penelope turned to face them too, and when their eyes met, Josie’s hands ached. She wanted nothing more than to close the distance between them and touch Penelope again, to be close to her without being afraid of saying or doing the wrong thing to upset her. She wanted so badly to kiss her, then and there, in front of Izzie and Davina and the other twenty students around them. But instead, she just stood there, waiting for Penelope to say something; anything. 

 

“Josie.”

 

Her feet were moving before she even knew what she was doing. She was so tired of walking on eggshells that she decided she didn’t want to walk at all. She turned on her heels and headed for her room, wanting nothing more than to bury her head under her pillows and pretend like none of this ever happened; pretend like her mom never learned of the merge, pretend like Izzie never came into their lives, and pretend like Penelope still loved her as much as she used to.

 

“Josie, wait!”

 

She didn’t stop until she reached their room. And as soon as she was inside, she spelled the door shut behind her, effectively locking your average human being out.

 

“Josie… Please, just let me in. Let me explain.”

 

She was pacing at this point, not quite sure what she was expecting to happen, but somehow still dissatisfied with the outcome. She knew Penelope would follow her. She knew Penelope would catch up to her. And she knew Penelope was capable of finding her way around a basic barrier spell with barely any effort at all. But she also knew that Penelope would never push her way in if Josie didn’t want her to.

 

“I know what you’re thinking…”

 

The girl’s voice became lower as she continued speaking, and Josie had to strain to hear it with all of the noise coming from the hallway. She found herself drawn to it, like their years together had made Penelope’s voice a sort of comfort for Josie. She couldn’t help but gravitate towards the door until she found herself standing right in front of it.

 

“… and I promise, it’s not what it looked like.”

 

Josie let her head thump against the door. Closing her eyes in an attempt to clear her mind and push the bad thoughts away, she let out a deep breath and wrapped her hand around the doorknob.

 

“I’m sorry for the way I left that night, and I’m sorry for not letting you in. I’m so, so sorry… for everything. I wanted to find you yesterday and then again this morning, but I wasn’t sure if you actually wanted to see me after the way I treated you…”

 

She felt a light pressure on the other side of the door, and she knew right away that Penelope had laid her hand against it.

 

“Josie…”

 

Josie's hand that was clutching the doorknob wrapped itself more firmly around it, moving ever so lightly in an attempt to give her time to change her mind, to back away from the door and shut Penelope out; but then she remembered what Davina had said to her earlier that morning, _“Neither one of you can do this alone. You need each other, and you can’t afford to be apart.”_

  

Josie turned the knob completely, and pulled the door slowly inwards, all the while looking down at the ground, hoping to avoid making eye contact for now. She turned her back to the door and heard Penelope make her way inside and shut the door behind her.

 

A few moments passed before Penelope broke the silence in the room, “Please, just… say something? Anything.”

 

Josie knew that nothing had happened between Izzie and Penelope. They had grown past the insecurity and doubt in the last few years, and she trusted Penelope way too much to know better than to let these kinds of thoughts cloud her thinking. But it wasn’t that she didn’t trust Penelope. It was that she didn’t trust Izzie, “Why her?”

 

“What?”

  

She turned around then, having regained enough of her composure to be able to stand her ground in front of Penelope without falling apart completely, “What’s so special about her?”

  

“It’s not about her.”

  

“Maybe you couldn’t see the way she was looking at you, Penelope, but I did. She’s falling for you.”

  

“I can’t believe this.”

 

“What?”

 

“I can’t believe that’s what you’re worried about. After everything we’ve been through – with everything we’re still going through, I can’t believe you’re worried about this.”

 

“I know that look, Penelope…” Josie said, shaking her head and taking a step closer to Penelope, “I know it because that’s how you look at me – or at least how you used to.”

 

She saw the way Penelope’s eyes closed shut, and the way her shoulders tensed. She heard her sigh and saw her struggle with her words before she finally settled on what she thought was the only thing she could say, “I told you. It’s not what you think.”

 

“Then what is it?! Tell m-”

 

Josie had barely gotten her words out before Penelope had cut her off, “I lied before.” She said it in a rush, with her eyes closed and her eyebrows furrowed. Josie could tell this wasn’t something that was easy for the girl to admit, so she stayed quiet and waited for her to tell the truth that Josie had been waiting to hear for the past three years, “I wasn’t mad at you because of Izzie. I was upset because of what happened before that.”

 

And there it was. For some reason, no matter how sure Josie had been about this, and no matter how much it had plagued her to think about over the years; after everything, she realized she still wasn’t ready to hear it.

 

“I knew it... It’s been three years, Penelope. How many times do I have to keep apologizing for something I didn’t even do?”

 

Josie was still standing a few feet away from Penelope, but she knew her well enough to know that her throat was starting to burn, and her voice was going to crack with her next words, “I know, I’m sorry. I’m not trying to make you feel this way; I just-”

 

A sudden thought ran through Josie’s mind. As hard as she tried, she couldn’t bring herself to remember the last time she had seen Penelope cry. She realized just then that that was another thing the girl had taken away from herself to make sure Josie felt comfortable.

 

Josie held her breath, trying to brace herself for whatever was coming next.

 

“Every time I think of her… it’s like my body’s itching to react… like this overwhelming sense of rage comes over me and cancels out every other emotion I have, and it _terrifies_ me – that I have it in me to hate someone so much, but also that it can end up affecting my relationship with you. You’re the most important person in the entire world to me, Josie; and I can’t even look at you anymore without thinking of her.”

 

It felt like a spell had worn off, and Josie could move again; except now she felt like her legs were failing her. She sat on the edge of their bed and gave herself some time to process what she had just learned. Penelope took the quiet as an excuse to sit down as well, and Josie realized that this was the closest they’d been to each other in days. She also realized that she hadn’t been able to sleep well since their fight, but as soon Penelope was near her, she felt tired again, like she could sleep forever without a single worry in the world.

 

“You know how you just asked me how Izzie having feelings for you was seriously what I was upset about?” She felt Penelope’s eyes on her, but Josie still didn’t turn to look at the girl, afraid of being faced with the pain Penelope had been repressing for so long, afraid of not being able to comfort her, or hold her, or take her pain away, “I would much rather worry about that than worry about everything else.”

 

A beat passed between them. Neither of them could find the right words to tell the other what they wanted them to know. Josie wanted to tell Penelope that she was tired of fighting; that all she wanted to do was run away with her and live out the next 23 days in peace, away from her family and their friends, away from all of the sadness and fear and anger in their lives. And she didn’t know it at the time, but Penelope was actually praying Josie would just say it out loud; like all of the times Penelope had said no to Josie’s pleading with her to run away together never happened; like she was finally ready to admit the truth to herself. All Penelope ever really wanted was Josie. The rest of the world could burn for all she cared.

 

But that was the difference a few years made. 18-year-old Penelope would have packed their bags, driven them halfway across the world, and never looked back once, and 17-year-old Penelope, the Penelope that hadn’t met Josie yet, the Penelope that had just lost her parents, would have killed Caroline as soon as she had learned the truth.

 

The old Penelope would have been selfish. But they were adults now, and 22-year-old Penelope would never take Josie away from the people she cared about, especially not when they needed her the most.

 

“I think I should go.”

 

Josie missed her window, and Penelope had decided for them. Maybe the girl thought some time apart would do them some good, or maybe it was just one of her rare terrible ideas. Either way, something had to change, and Penelope thought it was up to her to do the changing.

 

“What?”

 

She turned to face Penelope, then, and the sight of the girl made her stomach flip. Her eyes were red and bloodshot. Tears were still streaming down her face freely. And Josie knew that the exhaustion on Penelope’s face was just a reflection of her own.

 

“I need to find a way to move on, Josie, because I can’t go on feeling like this anymore. It’s killing me. I haven’t seen them since our fight, you know, Benji and my parents. I stopped because every time I see their faces, I picture the way they died. I imagine the fear in Benji’s heart, and the powerlessness my parents must’ve felt knowing they couldn’t do anything to save him. I think about how hard they tried to protect us, ever since we were born, and I feel like I’m letting them down just by letting her live.”

 

Josie felt her heart constrict. Not knowing what else to say except for the one thing that she needed to know the most, she whispered her next words out with as much care as she could muster, afraid of saying them and terrified of the response they would bring her, “So, where does that leave us?”

 

“I don’t know. All I know is… this isn’t fair to you; none of it is. You deserve better, and right now I’m not sure I can give that to you.”

 

Penelope stood up to leave, and it took everything in Josie not to hold her back and ask her to stay. She wanted so desperately to stop her, but all she could say was one word, almost pleading but not quite strong enough, “Penelope…”

 

Penelope’s back was still to her, and Josie understood why. If she was in Penelope’s shoes and she looked back, she might not have had the strength to let go either, “I’ll see you around, Jojo.”

 

If you had asked Josie how many times she'd cried in the past couple of months, how many times she'd buried her head in Penelope’s neck and her body in Penelope’s arms and cried like the world was ending, because it was, she would have told you that she'd lost count. But if you had asked her that day, the day that Penelope had officially walked away from her, she would have only said two words.

 

"Not enough."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So... let me know what you're thinking. I love you all, thank you for reading.  
> —  
> twitter: @voidpen  
> curiouscat: https://curiouscat.me/voidpen


	5. -21 days

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The realization.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Couldn't wait until Saturday to post this one, and the next one will be up either Friday or Saturday night. You might want to get some tissues.

Growing up, every kid is trained to think of their future.

 

Throughout our school years, knowledge and tools are passed on to us by those who forgot what it felt like to be a kid in the first place; what it felt like to believe, with every part of your being, that your entire life was ahead of you, and that you could be anything you wanted to be in the world. They thought teaching us about math formulas that we’ll never use, and history lessons that we’ll eventually forget would help get us ready for what came next.

 

We’re also taught from a very young age that, one day, the decisions we make when we’re barely old enough to make decisions, will affect every single aspect of our lives. They put us down and question what little trust they placed in us as teenagers, but somehow expect us to make the most important decision of all when we’re only 18.

 

They tell us that we’ll graduate high school and move to college; that we’ll lose our friends, but it’s alright because we’ll make new ones; that we’ll fall in love and get our hearts broken, and then fall in love all over again because human beings are resilient.

 

They tell us college will be the greatest years of our lives, and that when it’s over, our careers will shape who we become as human beings. They say we’ll reach an age where we decide it’s time for us to settle down, get married, and have kids of our own.

 

And all of it sounds nice in theory when you’re a kid and don’t know any better, but Penelope was an adult now, and she realized “what do you want to do when you grow up?” wasn’t a question. It was a trap. And she thought those people were full of shit.

 

In the past four years, her life had changed in so many ways that sometimes, she could barely even remember who she was or what she wanted to be.

 

She found the love of her life and lost her in the same year. She made sacrifices that broke her heart and learned secrets that shook her to her core, all when she was barely an adult and had no one to guide her through any of it. She came to terms with the fact that college wasn’t her first priority, and only enrolled because she needed to be close to the people she loved. And she couldn’t think past 23, because she wasn’t sure she would want to make it past 22.

 

The truth was, all of the things they had been preparing her for ever since she was a kid, didn’t matter now. The only thing that mattered was Josie. And Penelope had somehow managed to lose her all over again.

  

She spent the last couple of days driving around in her car. She drove all the way out to the place she’d taken Josie to just a few days ago, and spent an entire afternoon there, falling asleep as soon as night fell and hoping she would dream of Josie; hoping she would wake up and Josie would be there next to her, as if the phone call that started this mess never even happened. But she never did, and when she woke up the next day, Josie wasn’t there.

 

Running her fingers through her hair, she dropped her head against the wheel of the car abruptly, jumping at the sound of the car horn going off. She wasn’t sure how much longer she could keep this up. She was sore, hungry, and tired when she finally decided it was time to put the car in gear and head back to the university. It took her a few hours, and by the time she got there, the sun was setting, and the campus was quiet. She headed straight for Hope’s room, not entirely sure how she’d be greeted seeing as how she’d lost her phone, and nobody had heard from her in the past few days.

 

She knocked first, wanting to make sure the girl was decent before she barged into a room that wasn’t hers.  When no answer came, she gently turned the doorknob and pushed the door in slowly. The room was somewhat dark, and the majority of the light source was coming from the sunset rays pushing their way past the open window blinds. She looked around briefly before she heard Hope’s voice coming from the side of the bed.

 

“She lives.”

 

She knew this was going to be bad.

 

“Hi, Hope.”

 

“I know you’d much rather read the newspaper or whatever, but maybe keep your phone on you the next time you decide to disappear, so we don’t all just assume you died?”

 

Penelope winced, almost as if she had just suffered a blow to her stomach. She should’ve seen this coming, “I’m sorry… I know I should’ve said something. I just really needed some space, and I lost my phone a couple of days ago.”

 

Penelope hadn’t tried to move from her spot near the door since she walked in. She was afraid Hope might ask her to leave any minute but was also ready to if that was what her best friend wanted. When she saw the girl turn to face away from her, she thought that was the last thing she had planned to say, but Hope reached into her bedside table and tossed something to Penelope. Thankfully, her reflexes were still fast enough that she was able to use a spell to slow it down before it hit the ground.

 

“You left it here the first night you stayed over.”

 

“I didn’t know. I’m sorry.”

 

Reaching forward, she grabbed the phone from mid-air and unlocked it. Her eyes had adjusted themselves to the soft light coming from outside, so the brightness of the home screen made her squint to readjust.

 

“You know, I already feel like I’m going to lose you at any second.”

 

Penelope’s attention was once again on her best friend. She was now sitting on the side of the bed, legs dangling down with her back to Penelope. Penelope hadn’t heard Hope sound that insecure about anything in a long time, “Hope, I-”

 

“Save it for Josie, Pen.”

 

And just like that, with her back still to Penelope, Hope stood up and headed for the bathroom, turning the light on and shutting the door behind her.

 

Penelope hadn’t thought it was possible for her to feel more awful than she already did, but she was wrong about that too, apparently.

 

Deciding it was best for her to leave Hope be for the moment, she turned around and headed back out. The library was her safest bet, so she headed there next, letting her steps guide her and focusing her attention to the phone still in her hand. She lifted it up once again and pressed her thumb to the home button, expecting to find a number of messages from Hope asking her where she had gone, but finding that, in reality, most of the messages were from Josie, and while a couple of them were timestamped a few hours ago, most of them were actually delivered four days ago, the night of their fight.

 

Penelope’s stomach dropped. She had been so afraid of facing Josie after how she had treated her that night that the thought of the girl forgiving her never even crossed her mind. Every time she messed up; she found a way to convince herself that there was no way back from it, when the truth was, Josie had been there all along, just waiting for her to come home.

 

She kept walking until her feet stopped where they usually did. Her favorite spot in the library was now officially a hiding place. Dropping down to her knees, she let the events of the past few days replay in her mind for what felt like the hundredth time.

 

“Penny for your thoughts?”

 

Penelope didn’t have to lift her head to know who that voice belonged to, “I thought I told you the bad pickup lines had to go.”

 

Izzie was standing near one of the bookshelves Penelope had passed on her way in. The vampire was leaning her shoulder against the section on occult studies, arms behind her back and head tilted to the side.

 

“Did you? I have a very selective memory.”

 

Penelope smiled despite herself, a weak smile, but it made her feel like herself again. Izzie was the one person Penelope allowed herself to talk to about something other than the merge, and the curse, and her family. She didn’t feel like crying every time she looked at her, she wasn’t afraid of losing her, and in the few times that they’d spoken to each other, Penelope had felt like herself again. She admired that about Izzie, how sure she was of herself and how that translated to everyone around her. It reminded Penelope of her younger self.

  

“How are you feeling?”

 

“Not great.”

 

“Do you want to talk about it?”

 

The chance to turn your life around came differently to everyone, but Penelope finally realized that this might have been it for her – the first step, “No… but I think I need to.”

 

“Good… I’m listening.”

 

She took a deep breath, and tried to steady her heartbeat as best as she could, “You remember how I told you that Josie and I had a fight the night we met you at the bar?”

  

Izzie’s nod urged her on.

 

“I’d told her that I needed some space to figure things out, but then she saw the two of us hanging out, and she thought you liked me. I told her you didn’t, and that none of it had anything to do with you… and then I ended up telling her the truth… The _look_ in her eyes when I did, Izzie, I… It broke my heart. I realized I’d been hurting her a lot more than anything else, so I left. That was two days ago, and I’ve been MIA ever since. I lost my phone and when I got it back today, I found all of these messages that she sent me. Ever since our fight, I thought she’d want nothing to do with me anymore. I thought she’d be furious, or hurt, or too tired of being let down to reach out to me, but I was wrong. She texted a bunch of times asking for us to talk, and I didn’t even know about it.”

 

“Woah.”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“No, I mean… _woah_. For someone so unbelievably smart, you’re actually a dumbass.”

 

“What?”

 

“Penelope, since the very first day we met, pretty much the only thing I could get you to really open up about was this girl. The only way I got you to smile the other day was to get you to tell me about her, and what she’s like. You told me about the day you two met, and how you slowly became friends. You told me about how you spent most of your time trying to get her to see how special she was, and how you’d wanted to ask her out for ages but you, of _all_ people, were afraid, until you eventually worked up the courage to finally do it. Your eyes literally lit up when you told me about the day she said yes. Anyone could tell, just from the way you talk about her, that this girl’s the love of your life… so for fuck’s sake, what are you doing here? Pining over someone you already have? You just said it yourself, Penelope, she wants to give you a second chance… so why are you so hell-bent on convincing yourself that you don’t deserve it?”

 

Penelope brought her knees up to her chest and let out a shaky breath. Her throat was starting to close up and she could feel the familiar sting in her eyes. Shaking her head slowly, she finally turned her head to the side to face Izzie, “I keep hurting her, Iz… No matter what I do, I just can’t change the way I feel. I’ve been trying to push her away because of it, to spare her the guilt she already feels about all of this. And I know, I _know_ , she has nothing to do with what her mom did. But every time I look at her, I see the woman who took my family away from me, and it makes me so mad, I-”

 

Every time she thought she’d gotten better at controlling her emotions, they got the better of her; and in this case, she was crying again, but not the silent crying you did when you were trying to hide how bad things actually were. This was the kind of crying that made you the most human you could ever be. Her entire body shook, and she was gasping for air. She couldn’t even look at Izzie anymore, so she lowered her head to her knees.

 

“Are you going to let that woman take the rest of your family away, too?”

 

“What?”

 

“Josie, Pen. Hey, look at me…” Izzie touched her shoulder lightly, and when Penelope looked up to meet her eyes again, she tucked the strands of loose hair that were covering the side of Penelope’s face behind her ear,“… Josie’s your family now, and you’re pushing her away because you feel like you don’t deserve her, and you’re an _idiot_ for it. You’re… you’re amazing, Penelope. Anyone who spends five seconds with you can see that. And Josie clearly loves you a lot more than you give her credit for. So, I’ll ask you again; what are you doing here?”

 

Maybe it was the fact that she had literally hit rock-bottom, or maybe it was the fact that Izzie had pulled this reaction out of her, but Penelope felt better than she had in a long time. And for the first time in a while, she knew exactly what she needed to do.

 

Pulling herself up to her feet and wiping the dust that had gathered on her clothes, Penelope looked down at Izzie. She didn’t think she had the words to explain to the girl just how much she had helped, and how glad she was to have met her, so she did the only thing you do when you can’t voice the way you feel; she lowered herself down and gave Izzie a hug. Wrapping her arms around Izzie tightly, she was beginning to feel self-conscious, until she felt Izzie’s arms around her too. Letting out a sigh of relief, she breathed out her next words over Izzie’s shoulder, “Thank you.”

 

“You’re welcome. Now, go get your girl.”

 

Flashing Izzie one last smile, she ran out of the library. She quickly realized that it must have gotten pretty late because the halls were now empty, and it was unusually quiet. When she finally reached their room, she found herself standing in front of the door for a few minutes, trying to string together the perfect combination of words to explain to Josie just how sorry she was for the way she’d been acting. She wanted the girl to know that, even after everything they’d been through, even after what Caroline had done to her, even after finding out how impossible their situation was, Josie would always be the one thing Penelope loved most in the world, and she was going to fight like hell to show her that.

  

Taking a deep breath, she knocked on the door gently. When she heard the voice on the other side of it, she felt her hands ache, “Who is it?”

 

“It’s me…” It barely made it out of her throat, but she knew Josie heard her. When the door opened, Penelope felt a rush of emotions take over her. Josie was wearing nothing but her underwear and Penelope’s favorite shirt, and her hair was pulled up in a messy bun. She looked like she’d been trying to sleep for hours, but the dark circles under her eyes told Penelope everything she needed to know, “Hey.”

 

“Hi…”

 

“Can I come in?”

 

The two seconds it took for Josie to move aside and make enough room for her to step in lasted two minutes longer to Penelope. Normally, she would hate how insecure she felt, but right now, she was too busy being grateful Josie hadn’t slammed the door in her face.

 

Walking in, she was met with a thousand different memories she and Josie had shared throughout the years. If she had been alone, she would’ve spent hours looking through all of their old things; their pictures together, the letters they had written to each other… But Josie was here now, standing next to her, waiting for her to tell the truth; and Penelope didn’t need to reminisce about the past because all she wanted to do was think about the future, “How have you been?”

 

“Not great, I’m not going to lie. Haven’t been able to sleep in a while.”

 

“Jojo…”

 

“I’m not mad at you, Penelope. I just don’t want to fight anymore… We’ve wasted so much time apart and I’m so tired of fighting, I just-”

 

Maybe it was the fact that Josie was wearing her favorite t-shirt, or that she remembered how Josie liked wearing it because she said it smelled like Penelope – a desire to keep her close; or maybe it was how fragile Josie looked, warmth emanating from her and calling out to Penelope to just reach out and take it, balancing out how cold she felt ever since she left this room; or maybe it was just the way her heart jumped in her chest when she saw the tears start to form in Josie’s eyes; or maybe it was all of it at once, but Penelope couldn’t take it anymore. She closed the distance between them in two steps, wrapping Josie in her arms the way she’d thought of doing about a hundred times before.

 

As soon as they made contact, Josie buried her head in the side of Penelope’s neck, and her tears were starting to soak Penelope’s shirt.

 

“I’m sorry… I’m so sorry…”

 

“I missed you so much.” Josie’s words were muffled by how close they were to each other, but neither of them seemed to care because they were together again.

 

“I missed you too.” If you had asked her, Penelope would have told you that she was perfectly content staying exactly where she was for as long as she possibly could, but she knew how tired Josie was, so she guided them slowly back towards the bed. She made sure Josie was tucked in before she moved to join her on her side of the bed. Penelope barely had time to pull the bed covers over her before Josie had buried herself on her chest again.

 

“I need to tell you something. I know you’re exhausted, but I really need you to hear this, and I need you to let me finish before you say anything, okay?”

 

Josie didn’t respond with a yes-or-no answer. Instead, she pulled Penelope closer and nodded into her shoulder.

 

“I’ve been… _so_ awful to you. For the longest time, I tried to push down my feelings, and I tried to ignore them, and I tried to make myself not feel them… but it hasn’t been working. I tried to avoid the subject because the last thing I ever wanted was for you to feel guilty for the way I felt because you have nothing to do with it. You did absolutely nothing wrong, Josie. I need you to know that. I don’t know when I’ll be able to forgive Caroline or if I’ll ever be able to, but I promise you that I’m going to try; not because of her, but because of you. Because she’s your mom, and she loves you and she would do anything for you; just like I would… And it kills me that I made you feel like I don’t look at you the same way that I did before, like I’m completely, head-over-heels in love with you; because I am. I never stopped… And when I saw all of your texts today, I wasn’t able to understand how you could find it in you to forgive me after the way I’ve been treating you, but someone helped me. Someone reminded me that, no matter what happens, you’re the love of my life. I’ve never wanted anyone else and I never will. I would do anything for you because I love you, and you love me, and none of the rest of it matters.”

 

“Penelope…”

  

“I’m _so_ sorry, Jojo.”

  

Penelope felt Josie’s body shift against her, and she realized that about halfway through her speech, she had closed her eyes to keep from crying again. They were still shut now, but she felt Josie’s hands cupping her cheeks, and stroking her hair, and wiping her tears away, “Look at me…” And when Penelope opened them again, she saw a look in Josie’s eyes, and she realized Josie had looked at her this way before, the day she had told her about her birth mom, and how much both of them loved the snow.

  

“I’ve spent so much of my life waiting for things. I waited for my mom to come home, I waited for my dad to see what his job was doing to our family. I waited for Lizzie to get better so she would need me less… I waited for the girl I was falling for to finally ask me out because I was too afraid to ask her myself. And I’m so tired of waiting, Penelope. I don’t want to waste another second of my life waiting, and I don’t spend what little time I have left on this earth without you.”

  

Penelope watched, mesmerized, as Josie reached into her bedside drawer, and pulled out a small black box, and in the four-second span of time that it took Josie to say her next few words out loud, one thought flashed across Penelope’s mind.

  

“I’ve wanted to do this for a long time now,”

01: “What do you want to do when you grow up?” wasn’t a trap, was it?

  

“but I was so scared of losing you that I thought I should wait for the right moment to ask.”

02: I think I understand now.

“Penelope Park,”

03: All I want, all I’ve ever wanted, was to find you.

 

“will you marry me?”

04: But you’ve given up on all of this, haven’t you?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Do you still dislike Izzie? How do you think Penelope's going to react to Josie's proposal? Do you want to give Hope a hug? Please let me know what you thought of this chapter. 💘
> 
> PS: Probably going to share Josie's text messages to Penelope on my twitter account today or tomorrow if you want to see them @voidpen.  
> —  
> curiouscat: https://curiouscat.me/inbox


	6. -20 days

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everything changes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter's late because it took so much time and effort to write and I'm exhausted just thinking about it. Really hope you like where this story's headed.

“We have to get up at some point, Jojo.”

 

“I know, just… five more minutes?” Josie grumbled out, head tucked under Penelope’s chin, visibly reluctant to leave the warmth of their bed. They had both woken up about an hour ago and were very aware that Penelope had an early class she needed to be heading to soon. Josie, on the other hand, had the morning off and was more than happy to spend it sleeping in.

  

Penelope had initially disentangled herself from her arms, much to Josie’s dismay, but found herself unable to say no when Josie looked up at her with her signature doe-eyes and pout, giving Penelope virtually no choice but to relent. She felt a rush of warmth flood through her when she saw Penelope lay back down, pull the covers over them, and pull Josie back to her. She fell back asleep almost as soon as the girl’s arms were around her again, and when she woke up for the second time that morning, Penelope was leaving a series of featherlight kisses on her face, and whispering in her ear, “Babe, I really have to go.”

 

She didn’t register the fact that they were still holding hands under the covers until she felt Penelope’s arm move and, wanting to hang on for as long as possible, kept her hold until the very last second, one last hail Mary to try and get Penelope to spend the morning in bed with her instead. Once Penelope was too far away for their hands to maintain contact, Josie used her now-free hand to support her head, tilting it to the side to watch as Penelope searched the room for her pants. Their clothes were scattered across the room, a remnant of the night before, but Penelope somehow seemed able to recall where each item was discarded, bending down near the foot of the bed to pick up her pants.

 

Once she pulled them on again, Josie’s stare shifted from Penelope’s lower body and settled on her upper body instead. Her chest and neck were somewhat bruised: Josie’s fault, and her hair was slightly messy: also Josie’s fault. But what really drew Josie’s attention was the way the girl was smiling to herself, because it was the kind of smile she learned to identify as Penelope’s daydreaming smile, “What are you thinking about?”

  

She watched, entranced, as the smile widened and Penelope shook her head, refusing to look at Josie as she buttoned up her shirt, “Nothing.”

 

A rush of curiosity ran through Josie, forcing her to sit up, suddenly excited, “I know that smile, Penny. Tell me…” 

 

The hesitation on Penelope’s face was apparent but short-lived because it didn’t take long for her to raise her head and look at Josie again. When they locked eyes, she was surprised to find an intensity she wasn’t expecting to see. The air in the room had unexpectedly shifted, and Josie could tell that whatever the girl was about to say, it was serious, and she meant it.

 

When Penelope opened her mouth to answer the question, Josie was sure she must’ve misheard, but her heart still managed to start beating a million miles an hour and, try as she might, she couldn’t seem to be able to take another breath. 

 

“I’m going to marry you, someday.”

  

By the time Josie was able to focus her train of thought and string together a semi-coherent sentence or thought in response, Penelope had already beat her to it, “Don’t pass out! I just mean… eventually, down the line. I want to marry you.” 

 

So, she _had_ heard right. Josie would’ve been embarrassed by how flushed she must’ve looked in that moment, except she knew Penelope all too well by now to know that the girl loved having this effect on her, “I- What brought this on now?”

 

Penelope shrugged, top buttons still undone on her shirt, and turned her entire body to face Josie, briefly abandoning her desire to get dressed in favor of focusing all of her attention on her, “It’s not something sudden… I’ve always thought about it. I’ve actually dreamt about it too.” 

 

A rush of warmth shot through Josie’s body. They had been together for a while now, but Penelope still managed to surprise her. She was suddenly very aware that the amount of distance separating them was a problem, so she lifted herself up on her knees and scooted towards the bottom edge of the bed, where Penelope was standing.

  

“What did your dream look like?”

  

“Well… in _one_ of them, I took you to see the northern lights. I booked us one of those heated glass igloos under the sky, and we were laying there in each other’s arms. I told you about the exact moment I realized I wanted to spend my life with you, grow old with you… raise a family with you.” Penelope tucked a few loose strands of Josie’s hair behind her ear, studying every feature of her face before finally settling back on her eyes, “I tried to tell you how much I loved you, but I couldn’t put it in words, so I showed you instead.”

  

Penelope leaned forward, pressing her entire body to Josie’s, and placed both hands at either side of her face. The kiss was soft and deliberate, and even though it left Josie feeling lightheaded and weak in the knees, she couldn’t help but blush and smile back when she felt Penelope smile into it. Pulling back, Penelope rested her forehead against Josie’s, undoubtedly trying to conserve their connection for as long as she could.

 

“I didn’t get down on one knee because I wanted to be as close as possible to you when I asked. I wanted you to feel how fast my heart was beating,” she said as she took Josie’s hand in hers and placed it over her heart, “and how badly my hands were trembling… I wanted you to be able to look in my eyes when I asked you to marry me, and see how badly I meant it, all of it… because I did. And I do.”

  

Josie’s mind was numb, and all she could do was watch in stunned silence as Penelope leaned forward to place a gentle kiss on her cheek. When she moved away, smile still on her lips, gathering her things and getting ready to leave, Josie finally regained enough consciousness to say what she wanted to ask out loud, “What did I say?”

  

Penelope stopped again, textbooks now in her hands, “Nothing… I woke up before I got the chance to hear your answer.” The look on Josie’s face must’ve said something to Penelope because she leaned forward again, grinning, and connected their lips in a brief kiss, “I’ll see you in a few hours, okay?”

 

Josie didn’t move or say another word as she watched Penelope head for the door. It wasn’t until the girl’s hand was on the doorknob and she was halfway outside of the room that Josie could hear her own voice again, “Penny?”

 

“Yeah?”

  

“I said yes.”

 

If she had to choose one memory to replay over and over again in her mind, Josie would choose to remember the way Penelope looked at her at that moment, so deeply and unapologetically in love, as if she was so sure that any other emotion she would ever experience in her life would pale in comparison to the way Josie made her feel, and the only thing she could do was tell her.

  

“I love you.”

 

“I love you too.”

  

From the moment that Josie first laid eyes on Penelope, she began to learn that, when you fall in love, an ache starts to form in your chest. You don’t know what to do with your heart anymore because it stopped being yours the second she walked into your life, and you feel it break, little by little, every time she walks away from you. You feel a throbbing in your hands every time she’s near because your body physically can’t stand being near her and not being able to touch her. And, in a room full of people, you find yourself constantly seeking out her gaze, as if your eyes can’t help but be drawn to her; as if she was the only other person in the whole world.

 

That was how Josie would’ve described love if you had asked her years or even months ago. But today was a different story, because today, Penelope was standing in that exact same spot she was standing in months ago when she told Josie that she wanted to marry her, but she wasn’t looking at Josie the same way she did then. Instead, she was looking at her like she’d just had her heart ripped out of her chest and couldn’t understand how it had happened; mouth open and eyebrows knitted, painful realization painted over her face, “Why are you doing this?”

  

“What do you mean? Because I love you, and I want to spend the rest of my life with y-”

  

“The rest of your life…” Penelope nodded slowly, “You know, for the longest time, I couldn’t understand how you could be so calm about everything… but I thought you were just focused on the future. I thought you were planning ahead to what comes after we found the loophole. But it turns out I was wrong, wasn’t I?”

  

“Penelope-”

  

Josie could very clearly see the wheels turning behind Penelope’s eyes, studying and piecing together the cause and motive behind Josie’s every decision and action in the past three years, trying to make sense of it all, and finally settling on the one reason Josie knew Penelope had tried her hardest to avoid for so long.

 

It was strange, really, because Josie had tried to tell Penelope the truth many times in the past, both in direct and indirect ways, but she was only just now realizing that she had never accounted for the effect the truth would have on Penelope if she waited too long to say it. Seeing her now, Josie thought the betrayal the girl was undoubtedly feeling must’ve been multiplied by the number of days, hours, and minutes Josie kept her mouth shut.

  

“You’ve given up, haven’t you?”

  

She couldn’t imagine what it felt like to resign yourself to the reality that your soulmate had been planning on sacrificing their life to save yours all along, and realizing you were too busy to notice; too busy killing yourself slowly, trying to find a solution to save everyone, to notice that even the love of your life believed there was none, and that you were the only one still holding out hope.

  

Josie lifted herself to her knees and inched forward slowly towards the bottom edge of the bed. Reaching for Penelope, she brought her hands to the girl’s face, trying to get her to just hear her, to just listen, “Penny-”

  

But it was too late, because Penelope wouldn’t even look at her anymore. Josie had broken the love of her life’s heart, and there was nothing she could do to fix it this time. She didn’t say anything when Penelope stepped away from her, or when Penelope started crying, or when Penelope’s voice faltered as she put together the words to the truth that would change everything.

 

“If you thought for one second that my life was in any real danger, you would’ve acted already… or at least reacted somehow, but you haven’t. I can’t believe it took me this long to see it. You’re not planning for our future…”

 

Josie fell back on her heels slowly, holding her breath as if bracing herself for the moment she’d been simultaneously waiting for and dreading for years.

  

**When you believe a lie for too long, the truth doesn't set you free. It tears you apart.**

 

“You’re getting ready for your funeral.”

 

Every time Josie wracked her brain trying to sift through her memories for the exact moment she gave up on finding a loophole, she drew a blank, because that moment didn’t exist. There was never a clear moment during which Josie gave up, because it was actually an accumulation of moments that she spent watching Penelope drain herself of everything that made her who she is, gradually turning into a mere shell of the person she once was, all for a lost cause.

  

They were going to lose either way, and Josie believed it was better to live your life with the time you had left than to let it pass you by because you want to make yourself believe you’ll have all of the time in the world.

 

She looked down, unable to deny the truth in Penelope’s words and still too scared to admit it out loud, but Penelope knew. She knew Josie better than anyone else did.

 

“I can’t believe I didn’t see it.”

 

“ _Please_ , please just listen to m-”

  

When Penelope finally turned back to look at her, Josie could see the heartbreak in her eyes, the result of a prolonged and carefully-executed betrayal, but she could also see the anger, and she knew this wasn’t something they could just put a bandage on anymore.

  

“You promised! I said there’s no other way, remember? The day you caught up to me before I left Salvatore for good, I said there’s no other way and you said… _we’ll make one_. You said there’s always a loophole. You promised me you’d fight for us!”

  

Josie was many things, but a liar was not one of them. She knew that, on that day, she had also told Penelope that they might not be able to find the loophole and that if they didn’t, the thing she wanted most in the world was to spend the time they had left, together. And she knew that, deep down, Penelope understood her decision. She knew that they were both willing to sacrifice their lives so the other could live, but she also knew that they were both too stubborn to admit that only one of them could be the one to do it. If Penelope was going to hate her for this, then so be it, because at least she’d be alive to do it.

  

Penelope was pacing back and forth, so Josie stood up and slowly made her way over to her, trying to do everything she could think of to just get the girl to understand, “Penny… there’s no other way…”

  

“No! That’s not how this story ends. I’m not just going to stand by and watch you die, Josie. Not on fucking my watch.”

  

The determination in Penelope’s voice scared Josie, and she was crying the hardest she had ever seen her cry. It was as if all of the pent-up anger, sorrow, and anxiety that Penelope had manifested and locked up so deep inside of herself had burst out in this one moment, leaving her with no way or chance to contain it.

  

Penelope was the first to move, storming out of the room before Josie could even process the situation in its entirety. She had no idea what to do anymore, so she froze, trying to think of some way, some miracle by which she could just turn back time and go back to the moment they first met, when things were simple, when they were safe.

  

But this wasn’t a fairytale, and the real world was never that easy. Josie finally reacted, putting on the first items of clothing she could get her hands on and running out to catch up with Penelope. She ran as fast as she had in years, not caring about the sound her footsteps were making against the hardwood floor, or who she would wake up, and almost ran through Davina on her way to the one place she could think of to look for Penelope.

 

“Josie? Hey, slow down! Where are you going?”

  

“I can’t talk right now, Davina. I’m sorry. I have to go.”

 

“But-”

 

Josie didn’t hear what Davina said after that, both because she was already out of range by the time Davina could even say it, and because her mind was racing trying to figure out what she was going to say to Penelope when she finally caught up to her.

  

Barging through the library doors, she came to an abrupt halt when she saw a figure standing in the middle of the room. She knew it was a girl, and she could tell that the girl was trembling, “Hello?”

 

Josie kept moving forward, at a slower pace now, mindful of the state the girl was clearly in, “Are you okay?”

 

When the girl finally began to respond to the sound of her voice, turning around to face her slowly, Josie recognized her instantly, “Izzie?”

  

A table and several feet of distance separated them from each other, so she wasn’t able to make out the tears in the girl’s eyes, or the tension in her shoulders, or the way her hands were balled up into fists, until she walked closer, and closer, and closer, “Izzie… Have you seen Penelope?”

  

When no response came, Josie raised her voice, desperate and afraid, begging the girl to respond and practically shouting in contrast to the quiet of the empty library, “ _Please_ just… answer me. Have you seen her?” but Izzie never gave her an answer, and the only indication she gave Josie to the fact that she had heard her, was a faint and barely audible, “I’m sorry.”

  

Josie was now five feet away from Izzie, and her heart was beating uncontrollably. Every step forward made her more terrified and showed her something she hadn’t been able to see before, and when she was finally close enough to see the girl’s face, illuminated by one of the dim nearby table lamps, her mind was only able to register five things.

 

(1) The tears in her eyes, (2) the faint traces of sweat on her forehead, (3) the way her nails were digging into her palms, (4) the quiet sobs she was making...

 

(5) the blood on her lips.

 

When there was finally no space between them, Josie did the one thing her body allowed her to do. She took a step to the right and peered over Izzie’s shoulder.  

 

Her heart dropped.

 

“Penelope?”

 

Josie couldn’t move at first, refusing to believe her eyes, and too shocked to even begin to comprehend what she was seeing. But then she ran forward, pushing Izzie out of the way, dropping to the floor as fast as she could, and pulling Penelope’s body into her arms.

 

“Penny? Penny, wake up… Please wake up…”

 

She rocked back and forth with Penelope’s body pressed to her front, hand gently caressing the girl’s face, “Penelope, it’s me. I’m right here… please just… wake up.”

 

Her words were whispers, reserved only for Penelope’s ears. Resting her forehead against the girl’s, Josie tried to siphon from her, but there was nothing there. She couldn’t see the glowing red light on the girl’s skin. She couldn’t feel the familiar, warm energy radiating off of Penelope’s body. She couldn’t sense the love that poured into her body every time Penelope’s magic flowed through her veins. Because Josie was too late, and Penelope was gone.

 

Her tears were flowing freely now, falling onto Penelope’s face. Her worst nightmare had just become a reality. They had 20 days left before the merge, and Penelope was so scared Josie would wake up one day and decide to be the martyr before their time was up, so she beat her to it.

 

Penelope sacrificed herself so she could live, and Josie didn’t even want to live anymore.

  

Penelope wasn’t there anymore.

Penelope left without saying goodbye.

Penelope wasn’t coming back.

 

Josie’s body was suddenly on autopilot. She laid Penelope’s body back down gently and stood up slowly. She wasn’t acting on her emotions, because she had none left. Penelope was gone and nothing in the world mattered anymore, so Josie let go.

 

She was staring straight ahead when her next words left her lips, low and steady, “What did you do?”

 

When no response came, she tried again, raising her voice, blind rage dripping from her words, “What did you do?!”

  

_Make it hurt._

That was the first clear thought Josie had since she found Penelope, and the only one she wanted to listen to. She turned to face Izzie slowly, expressionless and numb. All of her emotions were manifesting themselves into one: rage; and she channeled that rage through magic, the way she had countless times before, except this time, it was worse. This time, she grabbed Izzie’s arm, siphoned the magic from her vampirism until she was screaming in pain, and only stepped back once she felt she had enough magic flowing through her veins.

 

_Make her suffer._

  

Josie walked away from Izzie, who had just dropped to her knees on the floor, turning her back to the vampire and curling her fingers into a fist. She didn’t need to say the spell out loud, because its presence in her mind was enough, and when the sound of Izzie’s screams filled the library again, Josie only pushed harder. She  _wanted_ it to hurt. She wanted to watch Izzie writhing on the ground, hands covering her ears in a desperate attempt to stop the pain, screaming and beginning for Josie to stop. She wanted to kill Izzie, but she wanted her to know what it felt like to suffer before she showed her that mercy.

 

When Izzie’s entire body dropped to the ground, eyes closed and unable to breathe, Josie thought: _Good. Now you know what real pain feels like. Now, you get to escape it._

She was two seconds away from finishing it when she felt a burst of energy crash into her, pushing her flying backward into a nearby table. Her ears were ringing, but she couldn’t feel any pain. She couldn’t feel anything other than blinding rage. Pushing herself off the ground, her eyes came back into focus gradually, and she saw Davina kneeling in front of Izzie, a worried look in her eyes and hands cradling the vampire’s face.

 

But Josie didn’t care anymore. If she had to fight Davina to get to Izzie, she would, and she would win, because she had to.

 

_End it._

  

Every bone in her body was screaming at her to kill, and she was listening. As soon as the ringing in her ears cleared, she would cast the deadliest spell her Dark Magic books had taught her, and she would finish it. She was halfway through the death spell when she heard it.

  

It was faint, but it was there, like a jolt back to reality running down her spine, making the overflow of blood rush out of her brain and gush back into her heart. She held her breath, closed her eyes, and tried to listen for it again, not sure if it had come from somewhere far away, or if she had imagined it all together.

  

But then she heard it again, louder this time, and closer still.

 

“Jojo?”

 

It took everything Josie had left in her to open her eyes again, but she did, and now everything had changed. Everything was different, and there was no going back from any of it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just going to wh*re myself out at this point. PLEASE SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS ON THAT ENDING BECAUSE I'VE KEPT IT A SECRET SINCE I DECIDED TO WRITE THE SECOND PART OF THIS FIC AND I NEED TO KNOW WHAT YOU THINK OF THIS PARTICULAR DEVELOPMENT.
> 
> ALSO, I'm most likely going to talk about this chapter more on Twitter. I usually respond to everything about this fic on there and on curiouscat, so if you have anything you want to talk about, here's my handle: @voidpen
> 
> Thank you for reading, as always. 🖤


	7. -19 days

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This one might hurt.

_You know that feeling you get – when you’re so tired, but for some reason, you can’t seem to get yourself to fall asleep? You toss and you turn for hours until it’s 3am and you’d give anything to just fade away. And when you finally do, your body starts to feel heavy, and you feel like you’re gradually sinking, deeper and deeper until everything around you disappears, and you forget to breathe._

 

That’s what Penelope thought death felt like.

 

When her neck snapped, she didn’t feel the pain; she didn’t feel anything, but her mind was still there, sinking endlessly. She felt like she was awake, aware that her brain was still functioning, but it was like her consciousness was leading her somewhere, and she found herself standing in a dark room that she came to realize was the inside of her mind, and events were flashing around her. The walls were moving pictures; memories she’d forgotten, memories she’d thought about a lot over the years. It was like every event in her life was replaying right there in front of her eyes, fast, and out of order.

 

She looked around the room, stopping and moving closer when a certain memory called to her. They were spilling across the walls, but they weren’t overwhelming. She didn’t have to keep up with them because she had lived them, and she remembered the important things.

 

She saw her sixth birthday party, when her parents had just moved them to a new city, and she felt like she had no one in the world, so they baked her a cake and sang her happy birthday to make her feel a little bit less sad.

 

She saw the day that she told her first best friend that she was leaving town, and she wasn’t sure if she would ever be coming back. She gave the girl a hug and told her that she loved her and left her crying alone on the bleachers, and she tried never to think of it again.

 

She saw the day that she got the call telling her that there had been an accident, that the car had come out of nowhere, and that her parents had died on the spot.

 

She saw the day that she first got to Salvatore and met Josie Saltzman, and her life changed forever.

  

But then, suddenly, everything stood still, and the memories faded until there was only one left.

 

Her little brother had just turned 5-years-old at the time, and he was playing outside on the front yard. She was sitting on the porch, looking up every few minutes or so, to make sure he was alright. Her father was working late that night and her mother was inside making them dinner, and it was supposed to be a day like any other except it wasn’t. She was reading a book on Greek Mythology that her father had given her when she first showed interest in the subject. It was on that day that she first read the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice, her favorite, and she forgot to look up.

 

“I remember that day.”

 

She hesitated for a second. She knew that voice like the back of her hand. Turning around, she came face to face with her mother, who was wearing the same exact thing she wore on that day. 

 

“I asked you to watch your little brother so I could finish dinner before your father came home.”

  

“Mom?”

 

She didn’t answer, and Penelope realized that she was too lost in the memory to see her, “I remember feeling so overwhelmed. I had a bad day at work, and then I got stuck in traffic and was late to pick you and your brother up from school… It was a Friday, so thankfully I didn’t have to worry about homework, or putting you kids to sleep early that night. Benjamin asked me if he could play in the backyard for a little while before dinner, and I said no at first. But then you came into the room and saw that he looked like he was about to cry, so you offered to watch him.”

 

She found her gaze wandering back to the walls around them. They were replaying the same memory, at the same pace, and she watched it all unfold in front of her eyes. When her younger self looked up from her book for what must’ve been the tenth time that night, she saw her little brother running towards the middle of the street, chasing after the ball he was playing with.

 

“It was my fault.”

  

“No, it wasn’t…”

 

She looked back at her mother then, dangerously close to tears, and met her eyes. There was an intensity in them that she’d forgotten was ever there; a kind of steely certainty. She wasn’t sure if her mother was really standing in front of her, or if it was all just some trick her mind was playing on her, but she went along with it because she missed her.

 

“It was mine. You were just a kid, and you didn’t even hesitate… That was the day you came into your power,” she looked back at the walls again. She hadn’t thought of this memory in a long time, but looking back on it now, she remembered how important it was, “You slowed that car down without even knowing you could, and you were so scared for your little brother that you ran into the street after him and got him out of the car’s way just in time.”

  

She was lost in thought, watching her younger self in action. That was the day her parents had told her that magic was real and that she had it in her. They explained to her that witches usually came into their power later on in their teenage years and that her being able to cast such a strong spell at such a young age and with no training was a sign that she would grow up to be one of the most talented and powerful witches in the world.

 

“We didn’t tell you the most important thing we learned that day. You were born to be a witch, but you chose to be a protector.”

 

Her tears were running freely now, and they blurred her vision as she watched herself carry her little brother on her back and take him back to the house. He was crying so loudly, that she remembered how much it hurt to hear him sound so scared, and that she promised herself she would do everything in her power to never let anything bad happen to him ever again. Her voice was coming back to her now, but when she looked back at her mom, she could only say one thing, “I just wanted him to be safe.” 

 

“And he was, but you didn’t even have time to think about it. You threw yourself across the street to get him out of that car’s way, and you didn’t even hesitate. You put his life before yours when you were barely old enough to understand what it meant.”

  

Her younger self didn’t even reach the front steps of the house before her mother was running out to meet her, “I yelled at you that night. I told you that this was exactly why I asked you to look after him, but you didn’t cry once. You just looked at the ground and stayed still. After that night, you spent as much time as you could with him, and anybody who saw the two of you together could clearly see that you were ready to do anything to protect him, because that was just who you were…”

 

The walls were changing again, and memories of her and Benji were flashing in front of her eyes. She missed him so much, and she still felt like she had failed him.

 

“And you’re still that person. Your father and I were far from perfect, and one of our biggest failures was never telling you enough, so I’m telling you now… You’re so much stronger than you think, Penelope.”

 

“I don’t think I’m strong enough anymore, mom.”

 

Her mother moved a few steps closer to her, closing the distance between them and wrapping her in her arms, “Yes, you are, sweetheart. You’ve always been strong. Your father and I were always so proud of you when you were growing up, and we’re so incredibly proud of the woman you’ve grown up to be… We miss you so much, and one day, when the time comes, we’ll all be a family again.”

 

She had her arms wrapped around her mother’s waist, and her hands were clasped together behind the woman’s back; so when she let go, it took everything in Penelope to let go as well. Her mom took her face in her hands and wiped her tears away, “But you have another family now, one that’s waiting for you to come home… You need to wake up, sweetheart. You need to wake up for Josie.” 

 

_Josie._

She suddenly remembered what had happened, and she nodded. She knew what she needed to do now, and she needed to be strong enough to do it, “I don’t want to leave you.”

  

“We’re always with you. Nothing will ever change that.”

 

Her sobs were the only sound she could hear. The walls were blank now, the memories were gone, and the only light in the room came from behind the door she could see over her mother’s shoulder, “Why does this feel like goodbye?”

  

The last thing she saw before the blinding light from the door forced her to close her eyes was her mother’s smile, and the last thing she heard her say before she let her go was this: “We love you, sweetheart. Remember that.”

 

_You know that feeling you get – when you’re so tired, but for some reason, you can’t seem to get yourself to fall asleep? You toss and you turn for hours until it’s 3am and you’d give anything to just fade away. And when you finally do, your body starts to feel heavy, and you feel like you’re gradually sinking, deeper and deeper until everything around you disappears, and you forget to breathe._

  

 _But then, suddenly, you feel like you’re falling. Your body jolts, your legs spasm, and you wake up, wake up, wake up…_ “wake up!”

  

It only took Penelope a few seconds to follow Josie’s voice, and when she fell into her body and opened her eyes again, Josie was there, kneeling beside her on the ground. Penelope didn’t think she could ever forget the look in the girl’s eyes, but she didn’t think she was in the right state of mind to face Josie right now, so she looked away.

  

She didn’t have time to ask why the library was such a wreck, or why there was dried blood on Izzie’s ears, or why Davina had to help her stand. Before she knew it, Josie was helping her up, slinging her arm around her shoulder and leading her outside to the hallway.

  

She was coming in and out of consciousness on the way over to their room, but she could see that it was now around 4 in the morning, so the entire campus was no doubt fast asleep.

  

When they walked into their room, the first thing Josie did was sit Penelope down on their bed. She moved around the room quickly and gathered a few things from every corner. When she came back to her, Penelope could see the worry in her eyes, and the panic.

 

“Lift up your arms.”

 

Penelope obliged, watching silently as Josie undressed her and threw her bloody clothes to the side. She was sitting, clad in nothing but her underwear, and she could tell Josie was trying her hardest not to look at her.

 

When Josie helped her get dressed again, she scooted up on the bed under the covers until her back touched the pillows. Josie was still kneeling on the floor, gathering a few things before she joined her on the bed and sat down, cross-legged at her side. The girl was much closer now, and Penelope realized it was because she wanted to clean the dried blood off of her face. There was barely any distance separating them, but it still felt like oceans because Josie still wouldn’t look at her, “Jojo… can we talk about this?”

 

“I don’t know what you want me to say, Penelope.”

  

“I want you to talk to me, just tell me what you’re thinking.”

 

Josie ran the wet cloth over Penelope’s face, “I think it’s better if we wait until you feel better.”

 

“I’m fine, Jo-”

  

“No, you’re not! You just died, Penelope! You’re nowhere near fine.”

 

Penelope was expecting this type of reaction from Josie, but she wasn’t expecting her own response to be so quiet, and barely audible to her ears, “I had to.”

  

“No, you didn’t; you didn’t have to do anything. We still had time and you knew that. You just thought you’d beat me to it.”

  

She would've been lying if she said that Josie’s reaction, no matter how understandable, didn’t make her feel awful in every sense of the word. But if protecting your loved ones came at the expense of them hating you, then so be it, “You said it yourself, Josie. Nature didn’t have a loophole for us, so I made one.”

 

“God, you’re so stubborn. How do you know you even solved anything, huh? The Gemini curse is decades old. What made you think this would even work?”

  

“It was something Davina once said. We knew the curse would break upon my death, but no one ever said I had to stay dead. Then I thought about it and realized nature would never allow a witch to become an abomination with no consequences. It’s the oldest story in the book. Once you become a vampire, you’re no longer a witch. So I lost my magic, and because the ties I had to my coven are gone, the curse must have broken too.”

  

“Wait… you lost your magic?”

 

Penelope didn’t miss the look of surprise that flashed across Josie’s face, and the guilt that followed shortly after, so she grabbed Josie’s hand and gave it a small, reassuring squeeze, “Hey… this isn’t your fault, okay? I knew this would happen, and I was ready for it. You can’t just go against nature and expect it to forgive you. I knew asking Izzie to turn me would have consequences.”

 

“I told you I had a bad feeling.”

 

“What?”

 

“Izzie, Penelope. I told you I had a bad feeling about her but you didn’t listen, and now look what happened. She killed you.”

 

“Because I asked her to.”

 

“And she did. What kind of friend does that?”

 

“Listen, I can understand why you don’t trust her, but it’s only because you have no idea what that girl’s been through, Josie. Me choosing to become a vampire wasn’t her fault and turning me into one wasn’t either. I told her that if she wouldn’t do it, I would just find another way. I told her that my life didn’t matter if you weren’t in it and that if I had to die to save you, then so be it. She was trying to protect me.”

  

Josie paused for a few seconds, and she had that look on her face that Penelope had come to know as Josie’s look of regret.

 

“I almost killed her.”

 

“What?”

 

“When I thought she killed you, I almost killed her. I saw you laying on the floor and I tried to get you to wake up, but you wouldn’t. You wouldn’t move, you weren’t breathing, and I couldn’t siphon from you anymore. I thought she killed you, and I wanted her to suffer so I tortured her. I made her scream until her ears were bleeding, and I didn’t stop even when she begged me to.”

 

Her heart was racing in her chest, anxiety suddenly overflowing as she tried to remember what Izzie looked like when she woke up, “But I saw her… she was still alive, so you must’ve stopped yourself. Why?”

  

“You. You said my name… You called for me, and I woke up.”

  

“I guess the same thing happened to me too. I was with my mom, and she told me that it wasn’t my time yet, because I had to find my way back to you… I followed your voice, and you brought me back.”

 

They were in sitting in silence for what felt like hours, and Josie had either finished cleaning her face of the blood, or she had given up on it completely.

  

“Josie, I-”

 

“You should get some sleep. I’ll check on you a little bit later.”

  

Josie was out of the room before Penelope had time to even ask her to stay. It was true that she’d thought a lot about doing this before going through with it, but it was only because she never wanted to die, and she wasn’t ready to either. She felt like she had just gotten Josie back, and that the past 3 years they had spent together weren’t nearly enough. She laid her head down on the pillow on her side of the bed and reached her arm out to bring Josie’s closer to her, wrapping her arm around it tightly.

 

When she woke up again, she knew that it was light outside and that Josie was nowhere to be seen. Her mind was groggy from the events of the night before, but it was more than that. She felt lightheaded and nauseous and hungry _,_ all at the same time. What little light was still coming through the closed blinds was enough to make her squint and turn away from the window. She stood up and headed to the bathroom, hoping that if she could just wash her face and brush her teeth, the feeling of disgust and discomfort would leave her, but it never did. When she looked back at herself in the mirror of the dim bathroom, she could see that her pupils were dilated, and her eyes were alternating between their usual color to blood-red and back. But when she looked down at herself in the mirror, just a little, she could’ve sworn that her heart stopped.

  

Her tattoo was gone.

 

“No… no, no, no!” Closing her eyes, she tried to focus, to reign in her breathing and focus on finding her little brother, “Benji? Benji, are you there?”

 

She waited and waited, keeping her eyes closed and trying to focus every ounce of herself on the image of her brother, but she couldn’t reach him, and no response ever came. When Penelope opened her eyes again, and she saw her reflection staring back at her, she realized what she had done.

 

The tattoo had healed, and the powers that she had defied nature to get had now been stripped from me too. She had lost her connection to the darkness, and she had lost her family all over again.

 

“Pen?”

 

Her fingers were digging into the sides of the bathroom sink when she heard Hope’s voice. She felt like she was going to be sick.

 

“Pen… are you okay?”

 

“I can’t find them anymore, Hope. The link broke, my tattoo’s gone... and I didn’t even get to say goodbye.”

 

A beat passed between them before Hope asked her next question cautiously. Maybe she didn’t know how to ask, or maybe she felt like Penelope wasn’t ready to give her an answer, “Do you regret it?”

 

Did she regret it? No. She couldn’t.

 

“Josie’s safe… that’s all that matters.”

 

She remembered what her mom had said to her, and thought that maybe, just maybe, things happened the way they were supposed to. She had defied nature for so long that having her connection to the darkness taken away from her was the most fitting punishment she could think of. It felt like her heart was constantly breaking, but she knew she would see them again because her mom had promised her.

 

Probably seeing the turmoil on her face, Hope walked behind her, draping something cold and metallic over her head until it rested against her chest. When she looked down, Penelope saw that it was a necklace, and thought that it looked familiar.

 

“I made this for you. Witches usually create daylight rings for vampires, but I figured this way was safer, less obvious. No one can recognize a daylight ring if they can’t see it.”

 

Penelope didn’t miss the fact that Hope changed the subject, but she was grateful for it. She knew her best friend would never believe that she was fine with losing so much of herself in such a short period of time, and if she let herself think about it long enough, she wasn’t sure she would believe herself either.

 

Penelope took hold of the necklace and rolled the stone between her forefinger and thumb absentmindedly, “Thank you.” Looking back at Hope in the mirror, Penelope realized that this was the first time in a while that she’d seen Hope look this calm and collected, and she also remembered that she was part of the reason why the girl had been going through a lot recently, “I’m sorry I've been such a bad friend lately. You deserve so much better than all of this shit.”

  

“You _saved_ her, Pen. You sacrificed everything to save both of them, and you’re still here. What you did may have been insane and unbelievably stupid, but because of you, three of the people I care about most in the world are still alive, so thank you.”

 

Penelope could see a hint of a smile on Hope’s face through the mirror, and she was grateful for it because it made her feel like her old self again; like maybe, things could actually go back to the way they once were.

  

She lowered her eyes when Hope reached out her hand and placed it on her forearm, “Josie doesn’t see it that way.”

  

“You can’t blame her. This isn’t going to be easy, Pen… for either of you. Being attacked and bitten and having to learn how to become a vampire is one thing, but willingly choosing to become one is a whole different story. You’ve given up so much of your life for this. I just hope you thought of that before you made this decision.”

 

Before she had time to respond, she heard the door to the room open and saw Josie and Lizzie walk in together. They both looked substantially uncomfortable, but she knew that it was for different reasons. 

 

“How are you feeling?”

 

Lizzie was the first to speak and that caught Penelope off guard, “I-I’m okay, thanks for asking.”

  

“I don’t know how to say this, and I don’t know if you’ll believe me when I do, but I just wanted to say thank you; for saving us.” Penelope’s gaze shifted from Lizzie to Josie, and she noticed that the girl was still avoiding her eyes, so she looked back at Lizzie and smiled reassuringly, “Well, you don’t get on my nerves nearly as much as you used to, so I figured having you around wouldn’t be the _worst_ thing in the world.”

 

The smile that made its way onto Lizzie’s face warmed her heart, mostly because seeing anyone act like she hadn’t just made the worst mistake of her life made her feel like a normal person again, and for that, she couldn’t have been more grateful.

 

“We brought you these... so you could, you know, feed.” 

 

Penelope’s eyes moved from Lizzie’s down to the blood bag she was holding in her hand, and she didn’t feel herself moving closer to the twins until she felt Hope’s hand on her arm. Her heart was racing, and her breathing had quickened. She couldn’t even hear properly anymore because of the blood that was pumping in her ears, but Hope’s grip snapped her out of it, “Where did you get them from?”

 

“Davina told us that the local hospitals infuse vervain into their blood supply, so we drove out of town to get these.”

  

Penelope was momentarily confused. Why would Davina know something like that? “How did you know where to go?”

  

“Penelope?”

 

She was snapped out of her haze by the sound of her name coming from the doorway. Turning to face the interruption, she saw Izzie standing in front of the door nervously, with Davina right behind her. Penelope felt a weight lift off of her chest when she saw that the girl was looking much better than she had when she had last seen her, and that Davina had clearly not left her side since.

  

Before she could even think about what she was doing, Penelope began walking towards Izzie, “Hi…”

  

She didn’t miss the way Izzie’s hands were fidgeting with the ends of her shirt, and the unease in her eyes when she asked Penelope how she was feeling.

 

She shook her head, tired of being asked that question but feeling guilty for it as well, because she was the one who needed to do the asking, “I’m fine. Listen, Iz... I’m so sorry I put you through all of this. I should’ve never asked you to do this for me. I should’ve never put you in that position.”

 

“I forgive you, just... don’t scare me like that again, okay?”

 

Penelope moved forward until she was standing right in front of Izzie and, noticing how nervous and agitated the girl still looked, closed the distance between them and wrapped her in a tight hug, “I promise.” Looking over Izzie’s shoulder, she mouthed out her gratitude to Davina and watched as the girl smiled and nodded softly back at her.

 

Letting go of her hold on Izzie, Penelope heard her best friend’s voice and turned to look at her, “Penelope… you need to feed. You’ll start to feel like you’re dying if you don’t soon.”

  

Her eyes instantly sought out Josie’s again, hoping to see some comfort in them, and finding none because Josie was still looking down at the blood bag in her hands. Penelope walked towards the girl until she was standing right in front of her, praying she would just look up at her, but she never did, and Penelope couldn’t blame her for it.

  

She took the blood bag from Josie’s hands gently and walked towards the bed, making sure her back was to everyone in the room, not wanting them to see her like this. She uncapped the bag and brought the top to her lips slowly. 

 

Her heart was beating out of control, her hands were shaking heavily, and the desperation that drove her to cling to the bag with such intensity would’ve scared her had she not been completely entranced by the taste of the blood.

  

But she’d barely taken a few sips before she felt her stomach turn, and she knew that something was wrong. She made it to the bathroom just in time as the blood rushed out of her system, and she was left shaking on the bathroom floor.

  

“Penelope?!”

 

She knew that Josie had followed her into the bathroom, and even if she couldn’t bring herself to look in the girl’s eyes anymore, afraid that Josie would see her like this, she knew that the girl was scared because it was evident in her voice.

 

Penelope’s ears were ringing, but she could hear everything. She heard her heart thumping rapidly against her chest, she heard the blood flowing through her body and into her eyes, and she heard the whispers coming from the other room.

 

_“What’s happening to her?”_

_“I don’t know… I’ve never seen this before.”_

 

She fell back against the bathroom tiles, brought her legs up to her chest and leaned her forehead against the wall. She closed her eyes, but she could still feel Josie kneeling next to her, tucking the hair away from her eyes, “Penelope, are you okay? Can I do anything?”

  

Something was wrong, that much was clear. She didn’t know why the blood hadn’t worked, but it wasn’t because she wasn’t transitioning – she _knew_ she was, and it was starting to terrify her. Josie was inches away from her and everything in Penelope’s body was telling her to feed again, and she knew that this time, it needed to be from the vein. She felt it, and she knew she had to stop it, “I’m alright… I promise. Just give a second to clean up, okay? I’ll come out in a bit.”

 

She had her head turned away from Josie so the girl wouldn’t see the truth in her eyes, and she let out a sigh of relief once Josie stood up slowly and closed the bathroom door behind her.

  

_“How is she?”_

_“She threw up all of the blood. Are you sure there’s no vervain in it?”_

_“Izzie just tried it… it’s clean.”_

_“Why is this happening?”_

_“I don’t know, Jo. I wish I did.”_

_“Well, what are we going to do? We can’t just leave her like this. She needs to feed to complete the transition.”_

 

Their voices would’ve been inaudible to her yesterday, but they felt like they were coming from inside of her body now. Everything was so loud, and bright, and unstable… and she couldn’t take it. She tried to remember the things that used to calm her down when she was feeling anxious, so she thought of her little brother, but it didn’t work, and it only made her want to cry. She tried to think of Josie, and the way the girl made her feel, but that didn’t work either, because it brought the hunger back.

 

_“The only other thing we can try is getting her to feed from the vein.”_

_“We can’t have her feed on someone, Hope. If the blood bags have vervain in them, then it probably means that the town’s water supply does too; we won’t be able to compel them to forget. And we don’t have enough time to drive her out of town to find someone else for her to feed on.”_

_“I’ll do it.”_

_“No, Davina. You won’t.”_

_“Somebody has to help her, Izzie, and if it can’t be a human then it has to be a witch.”_

_“Can you leave us, please?”_

_“Josie… what are you going to do?”_

_“Just trust me.”_

 

Penelope couldn’t hear everything, just scattered words here and there, because her hands were pressed to her ears, but she knew why blood bags weren’t an option for her. This was her punishment. You don’t mess with dark magic and expect your soul to stay intact. If she wanted to live the rest of her life as a vampire, she had to feed on human beings, and she had to learn how to control it.

 

She picked herself up off the floor in a daze and headed back out. The girls were all gone, and Josie was the only one left. She was sitting on the bed, hands in her lap, staring at the floor.

 

“How could you do this, Penelope?”

 

“What?” 

 

“How could you do this?" 

 

“I told you, I had t-”

 

“Stop saying that! You didn’t have to do anything! We still had time, and if you’d just thought about this for more than five seconds you would’ve waited! You have no idea what you’ve done. You have no idea what you’ve given up-”

 

“Yes, I do! I’ve already lost everyone; I couldn’t lose you too!”

 

“Penelope…”

  

“No, you don’t understand. This isn’t something I just rushed into without thinking. I’ve thought about it for a while now, but it only was supposed to be a failsafe in case we didn’t find anything else. When I found out that you’d given up, I realized that everyone else had to. I was the only one left still holding out hope that we’d all make it out of this alive, and I was an _idiot_ for it.” 

 

“Don’t say that. You’re not an idiot… but I still don’t think you understand.”

 

“I do; and I don’t want kids if it means I can’t have them with you.”

 

She knew Josie wasn't expecting to hear that, and the look in her eyes confirmed it. Josie wasn’t expecting Penelope to understand that being a vampire meant you’d never have kids of your own, that you’d never grow old, and that you’d only outlive the people you loved and have to watch them die; but she did.

 

She knelt in front of Josie, trying to get the girl to finally look at her, because she needed her to hear this next part; she needed her to see how much she meant it, “I don’t want the house, or the kids, or the future; I don’t want to live, and get married, and grow old, and move somewhere quiet to live out the rest of my days like everyone else. I don’t want any of it if it means that I lose you.”

  

“Penny…” 

 

“I just want _you_ , Josie… and I don’t understand why it’s so hard for you to accept the fact that I would give my life for you when you were planning on doing the exact same thing for me.”

  

She could see the wheels turning in Josie’s mind, trying to think of the right thing to say to get Penelope to understand why she was wrong. She expected that she would have to tell Josie over and over again, that she meant every single word, and that she would do it all over again if it meant that Josie would be safe, but she didn’t have to.

  

“Feed on me.”

  

“What?”

  

“If you’re sure about this; if you’re a hundred percent sure that this is what you want, and that you understand the consequences, feed on me.”

  

She stood up, shaking her head and backing away from Josie, “No.”

 

“We’re running out of time, Penelope, and I can’t lose you either. So, feed on me.”

  

“No! I can’t hurt you; I won’t.”

 

Josie stood from the bed, approaching her slowly, “You’re right, you won’t. You turned for me… for us. No one else can do this, Penny, so please, let me do it for us.”

 

She couldn’t think properly anymore. The one thing she had always tried so hard to do was protect Josie, and now Josie was standing in front of her, putting her life in danger, so Penelope could live. She would’ve found it ironic if she didn’t hate herself for it.

 

“Hey, it’s okay… I trust you.”

  

Josie moved closer to her, until there was no distance left between them, and wrapped her arms around Penelope’s neck; and Penelope could only register three things: Josie was too close; Josie was the love of her life, and she would never hurt Josie.

 

But she couldn’t help the fact that her eyes were changing, and her fangs were forming; and she could hear Josie’s heartbeat, slow and steady, and the blood rushing in her veins.

 

And it was too much, so it consumed her.

 

She dug her fangs into Josie’s neck and fed until she forgot who she was. She was faintly aware of the fact that someone was clinging to her for support, and that she was holding onto the back of someone's neck; except she couldn’t remember where she was, or who she was with, or how she had gotten there.

 

She fed, and fed, and fed, even when the person in her arms began to lose their hold on her, and their body began to sink. She heard a weak voice in her ear, “Penelope… Penny, please stop…”

 

But she didn’t, because she didn’t care. All that mattered was the hunger, and the blood. She could barely even register her own body because she wasn’t conscious of it anymore. She forgot everything. 

 

It wasn’t until the person’s body went limp, and she felt herself being ripped from them and thrown across the room that she began to wake up.

  

She regained consciousness slowly, and her mind began to clear slowly, but the hunger still hadn’t left her. When she looked up from the ground, she saw Izzie holding Josie; watched her bite into her wrist and bring it to Josie’s mouth.

  

Penelope’s mind was all over the place. A part of her was telling her to feed, screaming at her that she needed it more than anything else in the world, and another part of her was begging her to wake up; to just open her eyes and see what was right in front of her. But the one constant was the hunger. She couldn’t help it, she couldn’t fight it, and it was about to make her lose control again; but then she saw her.

 

Josie woke up in Izzie’s arms, and her first instinct was to look for her. When their eyes met, Penelope felt the blood drain from her eyes, and her fangs disappear. She was vaguely aware of the taste of blood on her lips, but she couldn’t remember how it got there. All she knew was that she was on the floor, crying, praying that someone would just tell her that this was all a bad dream and that she would wake up any minute, “J-Josie? What happened?”

  

Josie didn’t respond at first – she just looked at her, but Penelope knew that look, “What did I do…? What did I do?!”

 

“It’s okay... It’s okay, I’m fine, see? Izzie healed me.”

 

It was fear.

 

“No, I hurt you… I almost killed you…”

  

“Penny, I promise I’m fine. Everything’s going to be okay."

  

Josie was moving close to her again, and suddenly, she felt scared too; so she backed away as fast as she could. Once her back hit the wall farthest from the door, Josie stopped moving, and the look in her eyes was different now. She was heartbroken.

 

Penelope didn’t know what to say other than the truth, even when she knew that it didn’t mean anything anymore. She had done the worst thing she could possibly do, and she didn’t think she could ever come back from it, so she gave up, “I’m sorry…”

 

It came out as a choked whisper, but she knew that Josie had heard it because she was crying now too, and moving closer still, and Penelope couldn’t take it anymore so she ran, and she kept running.

 

And for the first time since she met and fell in love with Josie Saltzman, Penelope didn’t have a home, and she had nowhere else to go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So... slightly bad news: The next two chapters won't have Penelope in them, and they'll focus on the other characters and their own storylines (they should be shorter than usual but I don't know yet). I might not update next weekend, and post the next two chapters two weeks from now, but I haven't decided yet (will probably tweet about it once I do).  
> PS: I promise I'll make it worth your while in chapter 10.
> 
> Thank you all for reading. This chapter's the longest and hardest one I've had to write so far, and it's because I combined two chapters into one so that the last chapter of the fic could kind of be an epilogue.
> 
> Please leave me your thoughts below or tweet me @voidpen. I honestly don't think I would've made it this far in the fic if I didn't feel like you guys were reading (It's way more exhausting and time-consuming that I thought it would be), so thank you 💘


	8. -2 days

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 🤭

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Update on what happened while I was gone [READ BEFORE YOU START THE CHAPTER]:
> 
> I decided to turn chapters 8 and 9 that I had planned out into social media updates that I shared on my Twitter account.  
> I did this because the chapters weren't Posie-centric [although they included a scene with the two of them and lots of mentions] and because I wanted to share this chapter with you sooner.
> 
> If you want to read these updates, go to my Twitter account @voidpen, and click on my pinned tweet. I would recommend doing this because it fills in a lot of blanks between the day that Penelope left and the day that she comes back, although I tried my best to recap it in the first part of this chapter.
> 
> Really hope you guys like this one.

In the 17 days that followed Penelope’s departure, Josie felt like the earth was knocked off its axis. Everything around her seemed hushed, dimmer and slower than it had ever been before. She spent the first 9 days in what felt like a mourning period, although she wasn’t exactly sure what she was mourning. Penelope was alive, learning how to deal with her new abilities, and coping with the loss of her old ones, and everything else that she had lost along with them.

 

Josie neglected her classes during those first 9 days. She avoided her friends, dodged her parents’ calls, and laid in bed for most of the day until Lizzie was done with her classes and came to visit her.

 

On that 9thday, she learned from Hope, Lizzie, and Davina that the boys were in town for a visit. Landon wanted to see Hope, and MG and Raf decided to tag along to see the rest of the girls as well. Josie was buried under the covers the afternoon that the girls told her about MG’s idea, how he thought of casting an old spell that they had studied when they were younger to find Penelope. It was a combination of a Locator Spell and a Spirit Projection Spell, and it required all four of the girls to pull it off. Josie was reluctant at first, not wanting to deal with the heart-wrenching disappointment that would follow the more-than-likely failed attempts, but also afraid of what she would find in case they succeeded.

 

But eventually, she relented. She brought along the most prized possession that Penelope had ever given her, a picture of the girl’s little brother, to be used as the personal belonging that would link them to Penelope’s soul.

 

They all traveled together, probably wanting to offer Josie as much support as they could. They formed a circle and closed their eyes and found themselves standing in Mystic Falls, the place that they all used to call home. And they found her.

 

She was standing in the middle of the woods, her back to them until Josie called out her name and she turned around to face them. Josie could still see her in her mind. Penelope’s eyes were bloodshot and there was blood dripping down her lips to her chin, but she recognized Josie immediately, and her eyes cleared as soon as she did. 

 

Josie tried pleading with her, begging her to come back with them, but Penelope told her that she wasn’t ready yet, and that she was afraid of hurting Josie again, and so she ran away.

 

When she felt Lizzie’s hand on her upper arm and heard her twin’s voice telling her that they needed to leave, Josie told them to go, and that she needed some time to herself. And so they left her standing in the middle of the Mystic Falls woods, and she got to tell Penelope everything she needed the girl to know because she knew Penelope was still close by, and could now hear her perfectly.

  

_“So if you still want me, please come back before my birthday, okay? I don’t want to spend this one without you.”_

  

She said those words hoping that Penelope would hear them and find it in her to listen, and then she went back to the others and spent the rest of the days that followed waiting… until two days before her birthday, she saw Penelope walking on campus, and she felt her heart stop.

  

She was watching with bated breath as Penelope walked by dozens of people on her way into the building that Josie was in. Izzie was at her side through it all, clearly ready to intervene in case anything happened, but Penelope didn’t seem to need it. She looked strong, confident, and beautiful. Her hair was much shorter now, and she was dressed in all black except for the red bracelet on her wrist that her little brother had made for her. And it reminded Josie of the first time she had ever seen Penelope, the first day that the girl had walked into Salvatore.

 

Before Josie even knew what she was doing and before her mind had time to catch up to her body, she felt her legs begin to move towards the stairs, leading her to the building’s entrance to greet Penelope, just like she had done back then.

  

When she finally reached the entrance, Penelope saw her immediately, and Josie’s breath caught in her throat when their eyes met, but she could tell that something was wrong. Penelope had stopped moving towards her and after what felt like hours but must’ve been seconds, she turned to Izzie and mouthed a few words that Josie couldn’t hear, and Izzie looked in her direction. When Josie tried to meet Penelope’s eyes again, the girl was gone, and the next thing she heard was Izzie’s voice at her side, “She just needs some time.”

  

When she turned to her left, she saw that the girl was now standing next to her, “What?”

 

“Just give her a little time. She’s come a really long way, and she’s been doing really well.”

 

“Is she… Was she ready?”

 

“Honestly? I’m not sure. She still blames herself for what happened… I think she hates herself for it. As a vampire, your emotions are heightened, so I know that the guilt weighing on her must be unbearable… But she said she needed to come back.”

 

Josie couldn’t focus on anything other than how much she wanted to find Penelope, to talk to her, to hold her, to kiss her, to tell her that she didn’t blame her... She was almost too lost in her thoughts to hear what Izzie said next.

 

“She said she needed to come back for you.”

 

Josie thought she understood then. Penelope had heard her. Penelope came back before her birthday because Josie had asked her to, “Thank you… for helping her. Penelope was right. You’re a good person.”

 

“I- It’s nothing. I care about her, and I know how much she cares about you.”

  

Josie smiled, and Izzie returned it. It was strange how far the two of them had come in a short period of time, but she supposed that’s what happens when you love someone as much as they both loved Penelope.

 

Izzie walked past her, shooting her one last smile before she stopped in her tracks and turned around, “Hey… do you know where Davina is?”

 

“I think she’s by the bleachers next to the Fine Arts building. Do you want me to text h-”

 

“No! No, that’s okay. I’ll… I’ll find her.” 

 

The rest of the day went by at an agonizing pace, and the only way Josie could spend it was thinking about Penelope. She didn’t know where the girl was, or how she was doing, or if she was thinking about her too. So after her last class of the day, Josie went looking for her. She roamed through the university, searching in places and corners that she had never even visited before until she finally found her.

 

Penelope was standing with her back against the wall of a mostly-empty hallway at the back of the university’s oldest building, staring in front of her at the glass door of one of the conference rooms.

 

Josie stood by for a minute just watching her, wanting to commit her to memory. She looked calm. Her breathing was steady, chest rising and falling slowly, and all of the tension that had been building up in her shoulders over the past few months had disappeared. Josie wanted to remember this moment because it was the most peaceful that she had seen Penelope in a long time. And when Penelope finally turned her head to the side, sensing Josie’s eyes on her, she didn’t move. She stood her ground and stared right back.

 

Josie only pushed forward when she wasn’t sure she could stand still anymore, and she walked towards Penelope in strides, taking the girl’s hand in hers and pulling her to the nearest private spot she could find. In this case, it was an old janitor’s closet, barely big enough to fit one person, let alone two.

  

“Josie, what are you doing?”

 

Her hand moved to the door that she had just shut behind them, glowing red over the handle to make sure nobody could walk in on them, but more so to make sure that Penelope wouldn’t run away from her again.

  

“No… no, I can’t. I can’t be in here with y-”

  

“You came back.” She said it as if it was a statement rather than a question, and cut Penelope off before she could finish her sentence.

  

The girl was momentarily taken aback by it, by how clear Josie sounded, and how soft her voice was, “Of course I did… You asked me to.”

 

“Then why are you avoiding me?”

 

“I’m not avoiding you.”

 

“So why did you run away this morning?”

 

“I’m doing this for you, Jojo. I’m still learning how to become a vampire. I don’t have full control yet. Please, I need you to let me ou-”

 

“Izzie said you blame yourself for what happened.”

 

The words were flowing freely between them, and the days that Josie had spent practicing what she would say to Penelope when she saw her again were paying off, up until she mentioned that day, and Penelope had to brace herself before she could speak again, “I don’t want to talk about that.”

  

“Well, that’s too bad, because I need to.”

  

“Look, just… there’s nothing to say. I lost control. I didn’t deserve to stay after what I did to you.”

  

“And you don’t think I deserved a say in that?”

 

“That’s not it! I did what I thought was the right thing, okay? I was just trying to protect yo-”

 

“You left me!” Their voices had grown significantly louder in contrast to the quiet closet, so loud that they were practically yelling. But when Josie said that, Penelope went quiet, at a loss for words for the first time during their conversation.

  

“Josie, I-”

  

“None of what happened before you left was your fault, Penelope. You’re still new at this, and you lost control. It wasn’t your fault. But you left me… You could’ve stayed and we could’ve figured it out together but you didn’t and I… I thought I lost you again.”

 

“I’m sorry...”

 

“I’m not saying this to make you feel bad. Believe me, that’s the last thing I want. I just need you to understand what happened. Before we went looking for you, when the girls told me about MG’s idea to use magic to find you… I honestly didn’t know what to do. I was a mess since the day you left. I wasn’t eating, I was barely sleeping… I was so tired and so anxious that I yelled at Davina for saying that you wouldn’t want this; you wouldn’t want me to feel this way or do this to myself. I yelled at her because she reminded me of what you did to yourself before you turned. You went through what I was going through in 9 days… for _months_. You killed yourself trying to save my life, so how could I do any less for you?”

 

“Josie, it’s not the same… I wasn’t trying to hurt myself when we were together. I was just so focused on finding a way to break the curse that I overlooked looking after myself sometimes. What you did was torture, and you did it because you felt guilty… even though you had nothing to feel guilty about.”

 

“You know what? You’re right, it’s not the same. It’s worse. You were trying to save my life… and I ruined yours.”

 

“No! No, you trusted me and it almost killed you! All of this is my fault. No matter what you say and no matter what I do, I always end up hurting the one person in the world I want to protect the most… You know, sometimes I think…” Penelope stopped herself suddenly, eyes falling to the ground as she tried to gather up the courage to finish her thought, “Sometimes I think the universe doesn’t want us to be happy… so maybe we should stop trying to go against it.”

 

“What do you mean?”

 

“I mean… there are a million reasons why we shouldn’t be together, why I’m not good for you. You’re the most incredible person in the whole world, Jojo. Anyone would be lucky to be loved by you, and one day… the right person will deserve it too.”

 

“Penelope… what are you saying?” 

 

“I’m saying that maybe… maybe that someone shouldn’t be me.”

 

Josie could feel her mind short-circuiting, fully aware of what Penelope had just said, and yet completely reluctant to let the words sink into her; almost as if letting them make their way past her ears, down to her chest, and into her heart would shatter every hope and dream she’d had about her life with Penelope since she was 17.

 

She didn’t move, couldn’t even. She was rooted in her spot opposite Penelope, searching her face for any residual doubt, or hesitance, or regret… but there was none there. The one thing she could find in Penelope’s eyes was sorrow, clear as day and dark as night. In the five seconds that followed Penelope’s confession, time seemed to be moving much slower for Josie. She felt like the weight of the words that had just been uttered between them must have been strong enough to have shattered time itself, so that nothing existed beyond this place, this moment, this feeling. She was standing in a tiny closet in the middle of a normal class day, and all she could think was that none of it was real, and that nothing outside of the two of them could possibly matter. And then she started thinking, because she knew she had the time to do so. She thought about everything Penelope had ever done for her. She thought about the way they met, and the way her heart ached when she first saw Penelope making her way into the school. She thought about the months that went by when she had tried to pretend like she wasn’t falling for Penelope, and she thought of the months after Penelope asked her out that had made her the happiest she had ever been. Because being with Penelope Park was the absolute best thing that had ever happened to her.

 

She wasn’t sure what the universe would put them through next, or if it would work hard to ultimately obliviate every happy moment they would have in their lives together.

 

But she was sure about this.

 

Penelope wasn’t ending things with Josie because of something she did. She wasn’t saying this because she didn’t love Josie, and she wasn’t trying to purposely hurt her, because she had nothing but the absolute best intentions when it came to Josie. Penelope never wished for anything but the world for her, and Josie never wanted anything from it other than Penelope.

 

So she fought back, “Why?”

  

“What?”

  

She couldn’t remember ever being so sure of anything more than she was sure about how much she loved Penelope, “Why do you think that someone shouldn’t be you?”

  

“Because… I’m not good for you. At any given moment, every time I’m around you, I have to fight every single instinct in my body telling me to hurt you. It used to be the one thing I tried my best not to do, and I failed. I hurt you so many times even when it was the last I wanted to do. And now I have to physically hold myself back from it too.”

  

And she would be damned if she ever let that kind of love slip through her fingers, “So you will.”

  

“I- It’s not that simple, Josie… I don’t think I’m strong enough to fight it.”

  

Josie could feel her senses coming back to her, lighting every nerve in her skin until she could breathe again. Time was moving again, but it was moving backward. The collection of memories that she had gathered over the years and tucked away safely in her mind were finally released, coming together to form the perfect picture. She saw their past, their present, and their future, all in one perfect painting… and she clung to it like it was the only thing breathing air into her lungs, and used it to push herself forward.

  

She closed the distance that Penelope had tried her hardest to put between them in two steps and brought her hands to Penelope’s face despite the look of pain that flashed across the girl’s face.

 

“Please… _Don’t_. I don’t want to hurt you.”

 

Josie’s body was pressed against Penelope’s, leaving nothing to separate them but the clothes on their backs and the doubt in Penelope’s mind; and as Josie’s hands slid across Penelope’s cheeks, moving with as much tenderness and care as they could, until her fingertips were lining the now-present blood vessels under Penelope’s eyes, Josie realized that she wasn’t afraid anymore, “You won’t.”

  

“ _Please,_ Josie… please just let me go.”

 

She wasn’t afraid of anything but the thought of living in a world where Penelope Park wasn’t her soulmate, “No,” or the thought of living in a world where they didn’t get their happy ending, “I’m never letting you go again.”

 

Penelope was panting at this point, eyes nailed shut so tightly that the wrinkles around her eyes were showing. Her hands came up to meet Josie’s, grabbing hold of them to move them away from her lips, and she used her one last line of defense against Josie’s onslaught. Penelope turned her back to her and struggled to regain control of herself.

 

“Penny… don’t hide from me.”

 

“I can’t… I can’t,” It was choked out, almost as if Penelope was about to lose her voice, and Josie knew that meant that she was about to cry.

  

“Hey…” Josie’s hands were sitting gently at either side of Penelope’s arms until she felt a sudden rush of bravery course through her and used her left hand to cup Penelope’s right check, arm crossing against the girl’s chest, “Don’t hide from me…”

 

She could feel Penelope’s breath against her wrist, short and quick bursts of air warming the skin covering her pulse point, but she didn’t care. It might have been dangerous, and reckless, and absolutely insane… but she trusted Penelope enough to know that she would fight the bloodlust, and she would win.

 

Penelope was the strongest person she had ever met, and it made Josie stronger too. It made her brave.

 

“I love you, Penelope. The universe will never change that... I won’t let it.”

 

The girl turned around slowly, head dropping lower so her lips were pressed against the palm of Josie’s hand. Her eyes were shut, and her breathing was still ragged and uneven, “Look at me…” and Penelope did, and what Josie saw staring back at her made her breath catch in her throat.

 

Penelope’s eyes were clearing, the darkness leaving them until there was nothing but green orbs staring back at her, and the veins under them disappeared entirely. Josie didn’t look away until she could see nothing but the tear-filled eyes of a scared girl, and enough love to last them both a lifetime, “I’m so sorry… I’m so, so sorry.”

 

Josie had Penelope wrapped in her arms before the girl could even react. Her arms snaked their way down through the space between Penelope’s arms and her sides and settled securely on the girl’s shoulders. They were so close that the sound of Penelope’s apologies was muffled by Josie’s shoulder, but she still didn’t stop. Josie could feel her heart breaking for the umpteenth time, and all she knew she could do was whisper back and hope to God that Penelope would hear her, “It’s okay, it wasn’t your fault. Everything’s going to be okay. I love you… I love you.”

 

She hoped with everything in her that Penelope would commit the words to memory, and replay them in her mind whenever she needed to. Josie would repeat them to her as many times as the girl needed but she hoped that one day, Penelope wouldn’t need them anymore. She prayed that Penelope could learn to forgive herself for the things that she blamed herself for.

 

She begged the universe to be kind to them and asked it to help her look after Penelope because Penelope deserved nothing less.

 

Josie released her tight hold on the girl just enough for her to be able to bring their foreheads together, cupping Penelope’s cheeks and wiping the stray tears with her thumbs. She kissed every inch of skin on Penelope’s face, her cheeks, her chin, her forehead, her nose, stopping just shy of her lips; and whispering the only three words there was left to say, the only three words that mattered, “I love you.”

 

And that time, it was Penelope who leaned forward and closed the distance between them, bringing their lips together in a kiss that sent shivers running down Josie’s spine. Penelope’s lips were soft, and warm; and the way that she locked her arms around Josie’s waist the second that Josie kissed her back made her feel like she was finally coming home again. Her skin was burning, her heart was pounding uncontrollably, and she could barely catch her breath, but it didn’t matter.

 

She was happy. Penelope was safe. They were together. Nothing else mattered more than this moment in time, and the picture was finally complete. This is how their story ends. Josie would make sure of it.

 

When they finally had to break apart for air, and they stared into each other’s eyes in the five seconds that followed the kiss, breathing heavy and lips parted, Josie recognized the look in Penelope’s eyes instantly, and knew that they needed to get to their room as soon as possible. She took a small step away from Penelope, putting enough distance between them to offer the girl her outstretched hand, “Come with me?”

 

The shy smile that broke onto Penelope’s face made Josie’s cheeks warm, and she was vaguely aware of the kaleidoscope of butterflies that was shamelessly fluttering in her stomach. When Penelope took her hand and interlocked their fingers together, Josie let out a deep sigh, apprehension leaving her shoulders at that one small action.

 

Josie pressed her free hand against the door until it glowed bright red, and she heard the squeaking sound of it opening. Returning Penelope’s smile, she pulled her out of the closet without another word, heading towards the closest place they had to a home.

 

When they reached the door to their room, Josie felt a tug on her arm and realized that Penelope had stopped moving, and that her eyes were now glued to the door. Her chest ached at the look of fear in Penelope’s eyes, and she understood why it was there. This was where it had all happened. What used to be the safest place on earth for Penelope was now shrouded with the memory of fear; of what was, and what could have been.

 

“Hey, look at me…” She didn’t need to say more and she knew that, so when Penelope tore her eyes away from the door and stared back into her eyes, Josie smiled. The smile that she saved just for Penelope, and a smile that had grown to symbolize the absence of fear. It made Penelope smile too, and Josie thought… this is it.

 

_We’re home now._

Reaching the hand that wasn’t still holding onto Penelope forward, she turned the knob and pushed the door open, moving backward and pulling Penelope inside after her. Once the door was safely shut and locked behind them, Josie gave Penelope a second to regain her composure, seeing the way her hands were trembling slightly as she brought them together in front of her. The girl’s eyes were glued to the spot where it had all happened, and when Josie realized that, she used her forefinger and thumb to gently turn Penelope’s face to the left so that the girl’s eyes were staring back into her own again, and the doubt was once again cleared, and Penelope’s face lit up again.

 

“There’s my favorite smile.”

 

“I can’t help it,” Penelope’s voice was low and raspy, the effects of the past hour’s events clearly having put her in a daze, “I missed you.”

 

That gave Josie all of the confidence she needed, and the next thing she knew, she was backing Penelope up against their bedroom door until the girl’s back was pressed flat against it and Josie’s body was pressed into hers. She brought their mouths together in a feverish kiss, desperate and longing. One of her hands was resting against the door at one side of Penelope’s face, while the other was buried in the girl’s hair, tugging her closer, and it gave Penelope an opening to lift her shirt from the front of her pants and run her own hands across Josie’s stomach.

 

Josie’s skin was on fire, and she could feel the blood rushing through her veins and out into every part of her body that was touching Penelope’s, almost as if her body was reaching for the girl, trying to get closer. Their kisses were growing more and more desperate until every coherent thought that Josie had was pushed out of her mind completely and the only thing she could focus on was Penelope.

 

Penelope’s skin, Penelope’s smell, Penelope’s lips. It was all too much but it wasn’t quite enough at the same time. The way Penelope made her feel overwhelmed her to the point that she knew she would have to take several steps back to recover, but at the same time she didn’t want to; at the same time, she couldn’t get close enough.

 

When Penelope’s hands began trailing down her back, settling at her lower back and bunching up the back of her shirt to regain some semblance of control, Josie’s confidence skyrocketed, causing her to bite down on the girl’s lower lip, and drawing a low moan out of Penelope.

 

Josie was panting now, practically gasping for air, but she didn’t stop, only pushed further into Penelope as she brought her hands to the front of the girl’s shirt, unbottling the top two buttons with as much care as she could muster with trembling hands until she silently decided that Penelope had _other_ shirts and yanked it open. It was the sound of small buttons scattering against the floor that brought Penelope back to earth, and the laugh that escaped her lips sent warmth shooting down Josie’s stomach.

 

“I guess you missed me too.” Her breathing was labored, her lips were bruised, and her pupils were dilated but she was grinning now, a smug look on her face.

 

Josie decided two could play at that game.

 

She buried her face under Penelope’s chin, covering the girl’s throat with open-mouthed, wet kisses until she reached her pulse point, “You have no idea.” Sucking the skin and biting into the flesh there, she heard Penelope’s moan against her ear, significantly louder this time, and felt the girl’s hands tightening in her hair and at the back of her neck. Once the stings became too much, Josie ran her tongue over them, again and again, repeating the motion until she was sure her actions would leave a mark. She knew all of this was taking a toll on Penelope, because she knew Penelope. She knew how to make Penelope Park tick better than anyone else did, and it gave her goosebumps every time Penelope made a sound – a whimper, a growl, a moan... It was all music to Josie’s ears, and the fact that she was the reason behind them made her want to stay rooted in this spot forever.

 

Penelope’s skin felt significantly warmer under Josie’s lips, and so she rid Penelope of what was left of her shirt and trailed kisses down the front of the girl’s chest, grinning at the way Penelope’s back arched into her mouth, giving Josie better access, and the way her hands tightened up into fists in Josie’s hair.

 

And at some point, it must’ve become too much, because suddenly Penelope was pulling Josie back up and bringing their lips together again with bruising intensity, flipping them around so that Josie was the one pressed against the door, and Penelope was the one trailing kisses down her neck. And it wiped Josie’s mind blank. Her mouth was dry and her chest felt like it was on fire, and she couldn’t really help the way she moaned Penelope’s name, desperate and throaty, begging and pleading.

 

But before Josie could even register what happened, before she could comprehend why everything had stopped, Penelope was facing her again, except this time, her eyes were alternating between green and red, and pleasure was now replaced with panic painted all over the girl’s face, “Jojo?”

 

Josie didn’t hesitate, “It’s okay, you’re okay. You’re not going to hurt me, Penny. I’m not afraid of you. Just come back… come back to me.”

 

Maybe it was the unwavering confidence in her voice, or the way she found herself moving towards Penelope instead of away from her, or the way her eyes never faltered, never looked away, never showed any fear… or maybe it was all of it at once, but it worked. And slowly but surely, Josie brought Penelope back, and she would continue to do so as many times as Penelope needed her to, because that’s what love was, and that’s what love should be.

 

Josie waited for Penelope to initiate contact again, wanting to give the girl as much control as she could, and when Penelope found herself again, she didn’t waste any time.

 

Penelope’s lips came crashing against Josie’s, hard but not enough to hurt, and her hands made quick work of Josie’s clothes, ridding her of everything until she was standing in nothing but her underwear and Penelope had to take a second to recover from the sight.

 

“You’re so beautiful…”

 

Josie suddenly felt very exposed, the distance that Penelope had just placed between them when she backed away making her feel more aware of herself, so she broke eye contact and brought her arms together in front of her, nails digging into the skin of her palms.

 

“Don’t…” Penelope whispered softly, her voice making Josie look up again, noticing that the girl was closer now, incredibly so, and that Penelope’s hands were now covering her own, separating them and taking each in one of hers, “You’re the most beautiful girl in the world, Jojo… Don’t hide from me.”

 

Josie’s eyes had flickered down to Penelope’s lips momentarily before they snapped back up to meet her eyes when she heard her own words repeated back to her. When she saw nothing but adoration and love there, her body went on autopilot. Letting go of Penelope’s hands, Josie sprung forward, pouring every ounce of love in her heart and everything that Penelope made her feel into each kiss and every touch, and she hugged Penelope’s body to hers, interlocking her arms behind the girl’s back and pushing them back until Penelope’s knees hit the bed frame and they fell, Josie straddling Penelope.

 

The sudden shift made Penelope gasp at first, but she managed to recover quickly enough because before Josie knew it, the girl was sitting up and digging her fingers into Josie’s waist, desperate for as much skin-on-skin contact as she could find, while Josie’s hands tugged at the waistband of her pants.

 

She felt Penelope’s lips burning a line down the hollow of her throat, lining her collarbone and eventually dropping down to settle in the middle of her chest while one of Josie’s hands formed a fist in her hair, and the other wrapped itself around the girl’s neck for some semblance of stability as Penelope brought her hands together behind Josie’s back to unhook the clasp of her bra. Throwing it aside in one quick motion and using her free arm to bring Josie’s body flush against her own, Penelope flipped them so they were laying on the bed again, this time with Penelope laying on top of Josie, settling between her legs.

 

Penelope wasted no time dropping her head to Josie’s chest, leaving open-mouthed kisses on the now-exposed skin and using the hand that wasn’t holding herself up to dig into Josie’s side and Josie’s waist and Josie’s chest. She tangled her fingers in Penelope’s hair, pulling the girl closer still until she sat up, straddling Josie long enough to rid herself of her own bra. Josie’s breath caught in her throat at the sight of Penelope, chest bare, skin glistening with a thin layer of sweat, shoulders heaving up and down with each heavy breath. She looked as beautiful as Josie had ever seen her.

  

When Penelope lowered herself completely on top of her body until there was nothing left but skin to separate them, Josie couldn’t help the sound that escaped her lips, but it was soon drowned out by the procession of kisses that followed, growing hungrier as time went on, teeth biting into each other’s lips, hands frantic, fingers digging into every inch of exposed skin, and heartbeats mixing until they couldn’t even tell which one was their own.

  

When Penelope’s lips moved down her throat to her chest, stopping at her stomach and occasionally dipping lower to pepper kisses over her inner thighs, and reached up one of her hands to interlock their fingers together, Josie realized that she was the first to beg, and it took a lot out of her because she almost couldn’t catch her breath long enough to find her voice and string together the two words she needed to say, “ _Penelope, please_.”

  

Opening her eyes and lowering her gaze down, she saw the way Penelope was looking up at her, pupils dilated and lips parted, desire evident on her face before she dropped her head down between Josie’s legs, pressed a featherlight kiss against Josie’s underwear, and breathed hot air against the fabric, causing her hips to buck and her back to arch at the stark contact.

  

Josie’s heart was pounding in her chest and her eyes were sealed shut, one hand still holding onto Penelope and the other gripping the bedsheets, _“Penny…”_

She felt the bed shift slightly and opened her eyes to find that Penelope was now standing at the foot of it, chest completely bare but still wearing her pants, and it was then that Josie noticed the necklace hanging loosely around Penelope’s neck. The girl bent forward, slipping Josie's underwear down her hips until they hit they ground. She never once broke eye contact with Penelope after the girl left the bed, and she didn’t even when Penelope bent down to climb back onto it.

 

Penelope lifted herself up until she was hovering over her body, hands at either side of her face to support her weight, and she stayed there for a lot longer than Josie could handle, staring down at her like she couldn’t believe her eyes, that this was real and that Josie was with her again, “I love you.”

 

And as Josie stared back, she remembered what she had said to Penelope in Mystic Falls the day that they had gone to find her, the day that Penelope was still too afraid to act on her feelings, so she ran away from them.

 

“For how long?”

 

Josie had whispered the words into the night, but she knew Penelope had heard them… because Penelope was with her, and she always would be, “For as long as you’ll let me.”

 

So Josie brought one of her hands up and pulled Penelope down by the necklace hanging around her neck until their lips met again, wrapping her legs around Penelope’s waist, pulling her even closer and gasping against her lips.

 

And when she felt Penelope’s hand moving down the side of her body, fingers digging into her skin and leaving a blaze of fire in their trail until they grazed her inner thigh, she realized that eternity felt like a minute in this moment.

  

And that she would do anything to make this moment last an eternity.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So... yeah. Please let me know what you thought of this chapter and the social media updates if you decided to read them!  
> -  
> Twitter: @voidpen  
> curiouscat: https://curiouscat.me/voidpen


	9. -1 day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Peak angst, [but there are only 2-3 chapters left so I'll fix it eventually]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The first and last parts in Italic are voice-overs.  
> The first is from a scene in a film and the last is Penelope speaking [kind of like Meredith Grey at the end of every Grey's Anatomy episode].

_“What do you want? Y-You want the moon? Just the say the word and I’ll throw a lasso around it and pull it down… Hey, that’s a pretty good idea. I’ll give you the moon, Mary.”_

_“I’ll take it. Then what?”_

 

“Jojo?”

 

“Hmm?”

 

“Did you fall asleep?”

 

It was a little after 10PM when Josie began to drift off. 

They had spent the entire day in bed together, and Penelope had only left Josie once in the past 24 hours; only once, because she knew, despite Josie insisting the snacks she had left in their room were enough for her, the girl needed proper food, and so did she.

Penelope had slipped out of Josie’s arms earlier that morning, just before dawn, and gone looking for the point at which the town’s water supply ran out of Vervain. It had taken her quite some time but she was finally able to find it, and when she fed for the first time since she came into town, she felt her nerves begin to calm down. Breathing in, she remembered what Izzie had taught her about control, “ _You look for an anchor, you cling to it, and you let it guide you back.”_ It was lucky that Penelope didn’t need to look for hers, because she had already found it. Josie would always find a way to bring her back.

 

She felt the girl’s hold on her tighten, nuzzling deeper into her side, “Mhm, no… No, I’m just resting my eyes a little.”

 

Penelope couldn’t help but smirk as she replayed the events of the past day in her mind, “Took a lot out of you, huh?”

 

Josie groaned, burying her face into Penelope’s side to try to hide any trace of the blush Penelope knew was no doubt covering her cheeks.

 

“Why did you put on a movie if you were so tired?”

 

“I thought it would keep me awake…”

 

“I was thought _I_ was keeping you awake.”

 

“No, _you_ … you wore me out.”

 

“That’s funny… I didn’t hear you complaining an hour ago.”

 

“ _Penelope!_ ”

 

Penelope couldn’t remember the last time she had laughed like this, but she knew this was the happiest she had felt in a very long time. Sliding herself down the bed, she shifted so that she was supporting herself on her forearm, elbow pressed into the mattress so she could get a better look at Josie.

 

The girl was laying on her front, snug in nothing but her underwear and one of Penelope’s sweatshirts. Her head was resting just shy of the pillows, hands tucked under her chin, and she was looking up at Penelope, causing an overwhelming sense of relief to shoot through her at the sight.

 

She reached her hand forward to tuck some of Josie’s hair behind her ear, soft smile on her face, “I missed teasing you.”

 

Josie was quiet for a few seconds, but when she finally responded, she reached for Penelope’s hand and brought it to her lips, giving it a gentle kiss before interlacing their fingers together near her chest, “I missed you.”

 

Izzie had warned her that being a vampire meant everything would be heightened, that every emotion Penelope was capable of feeling – fear, hunger, sadness, rage… would all be ten times more powerful, more than enough to consume the strongest people, and Penelope had no trouble believing her because she had experienced it firsthand. The fear was unlike anything she had ever felt in her life and it _did_ consume her, almost to the point where she couldn’t bring herself back from it.

 

But she remembered now that Izzie had also told her that the good was intensified as well, even if she had trouble believing it at the time, she believed it now. The happiness that she felt in this moment was enough to drive every bad thought and every upsetting memory out of her mind, leaving her to focus on nothing but Josie; because Josie was all that mattered.

 

Needing to regain some sense of control before her happiness translated itself into tears, Penelope swallowed the lump in her throat and looked back at the screen behind them, hoping for a distraction and realizing that they were almost halfway through the movie, and that Josie had missed every second of it.

 

“You know if you want to go to sleep, it’s okay… I’ll still be here when you wake up.”

 

Josie shook her head almost instantly and lifted herself up so she was sitting cross-legged in front of Penelope, “No… No, I asked you to come back before my birthday and you did. I want to watch that clock…” she said, pointing just above the bedside table on Penelope’s side of the bed, “hit midnight, and I want to spend the first moments of my 23rd birthday knowing we’re together.”

 

Penelope’s chest felt like it had just expanded tenfold, heart pounding mercilessly in her chest. She pushed herself up on the bed so that her back was pressed against the pillows, and stretched her legs out in front of her as one of her hands reached for Josie, “Come here.”

 

“What are you doing?”

 

“Keeping you awake.”

 

She guided Josie into her lap until the girl was straddling her comfortably, and began running her fingers up and down her back, under her sweatshirt, leaving a trail of light kisses across her neck.

 

“Umm, Pen? Not that this doesn’t feel…  _amazing_ , but how is it supposed to keep me awake?”

 

“Oh no, this part’s for me. I want _you…_ ” Penelope brought her hands forward to slide them across Josie’s stomach, “to talk to me.”

 

“About what?”

 

“Anything... Tell me what happened while I was gone.”

 

“I told you. It was hell.”

 

“No, I know... I meant with everyone else. When you came to find me, I noticed the boys were with you. How did that happen?”

 

“Oh… um, Landon wanted to visit Hope for the weekend, and MG and Raf just sort of tagged along to see the rest of us.”

 

“That’s it? Why do I feel like you’re holding out on me?”

 

“Well… Hope broke up with Landon...”

 

“What?”

 

“And her and Lizzie are kind of a thing now.”

 

“… _What?_ ”

 

“I know, right? Talk about unexpected. Apparently, Hope had a crush on Lizzie since Salvatore… can you believe that?”

 

“Oh, haha… funny story, actually. I _kind of_ alreadyknew about that.”

 

Penelope felt Josie’s hand against her chest, pushing her away lightly just enough to be able to look her in the eye and feign anger, “ _And you didn’t tell me?_ ”

 

“I’m sorry, Jojo. I was sworn to secrecy. Besides, I was too busy pining over you to care too much about other people’s relationships.”

 

“Hmm, nice save.”

 

“I try…”

 

Leaning forward, she kissed Josie again, trying to memorize as much as she could; the way Josie moaned into her mouth the second their lips met, the way Josie buried her hands in her hair and tugged her closer gently, the way their chests rose and fell together, the way her own heartbeat picked up to match Josie’s. They only separated when they needed to catch their breaths, and Josie was the one who broke the silence with the last question Penelope was expecting to hear, “What about Izzie?”

 

“What about her?”

 

“I spoke to her earlier and she asked me about Davina. I guess I’m just wondering if there’s something going on between them.”

 

“Oh, I don’t really know for sure… but I have a feeling there might be.”

 

“I hope so.”

 

“Really?”

 

“Really. Turns out you were right… she _is_ a good person, and Davina deserves to be with someone like that.”

 

She smiled, relief washing over her, “I’m glad you changed your mind about Izzie. I’m honestly not sure I would’ve made it through the transition without her…”

 

“How was it… after you left?”

 

Penelope’s gaze fell inadvertently, staring down between them at nothing in particular, “She ran after me and snapped my neck before I could hurt anyone else. When I woke up, I was in Mystic Falls, and she managed to calm me down. She told me what happened wasn’t my fault, and gave me this really long speech about how strong I was. She said I’d be okay… and that I just needed a little help in the beginning.”

 

Josie’s arms snaked around her neck, one hand hanging loosely on her shoulder while the other toyed with the tips of her hair, “She taught you how to be a vampire?”

 

“In a way… She taught me how to hunt. I told her I didn’t want to feed on humans… She was hesitant at first but eventually respected my decision and taught me how to feed on animals instead.”

 

“And, it worked? You don’t need human blood?”

 

“It worked, although it doesn’t feel quite...  _right._ But it doesn’t matter. It’s still so much better than the alternative.”

 

“Penny…”

 

“She also taught me compulsion, and a bunch of other cool vampire tricks… some of which you may or may not have witnessed for yourself today…”

 

Josie rolled her eyes, unmistakably feigning annoyance because Penelope could tell she was trying her hardest to fight back a grin, and it made her smile as a result.

 

“And she was teaching me how to control my emotions. I got better at it but it’s still really hard most of the time. I think it’s always going to be. I don't know... sometimes I wish I could just-”

 

“What?”

 

Penelope was hesitant, wary of giving Josie another reason to feel guilty or bad about herself, not even sure whether this was something the girl should know. But when she looked up to meet Josie’s eyes again, she knew that she had to tell the truth.

 

“I wish I could just be a witch again. I just… I remember being around vampires at Salvatore, and most of them wouldn’t give it up for the world… even MG loved it, but-”

 

“You don’t.”

 

She must have been holding her breath, unsure of how to string together the right words to voice her thought, because when Josie finished her sentence for her, she let out a deep sigh, causing her shoulders to relax in the process, “I guess I just never thought I’d be anything other than a witch… and I know I was never meant to be a vampire.”

 

Penelope realized that this was the first time she had said those words out loud. She would never be a witch again. This was who she was now, and there was no going back from it… for either of them.

 

“Penelope… do you regret it?”

 

“I didn’t, not at first. I didn’t regret it until I hurt you, and it’s a lot harder than I thought it was going to be but now... no, I don’t regret my decision. We broke the curse. That’s all that matters.”

 

“What about… what about your family?”

 

“I’ll see them again… I just wish-”

 

“You’d seen Benji one last time.”

 

She nodded sluggishly “… I miss him. I miss all of them.”

 

“I’m sorry.”

 

“Hey… don’t be, it’s not your fault.”

 

A sudden thought crept into Penelope’s mind, persistent and nagging, feeding off of the uncertainty in Josie’s eyes, “Do you- Do you wish I was different?”

 

“No! No, that’s not… I just want you to be happy, Penelope. I would love you no matter who or what you are because this…” Josie touched her hand to her chest and then moved it to rest over Penelope’s heart, “this is forever.”

 

Reaching forward, Penelope slid her arms around Josie’s waist again, pulling her closer until their lips met. Josie was the one who deepened the kiss this time, and Penelope couldn’t help but smile into it. When they broke apart again, Josie trailed a series of light pecks from Penelope’s lips to her cheek to her ear, moving forward until her body was completely pressed against Penelope’s.

 

“There’s one more thing we need to talk about.”

 

“What is it?”

 

Penelope hesitated, preparing herself for the change she knew she would see in Josie’s eyes, and feeling at fault for being the reason behind it, “Your mom.”

 

“Oh, okay…”

 

Josie was about to shift their position, moving to sit on the bed next to her, but Penelope’s hands fell to her waist, stopping her before she had the chance to break contact, “No, don’t. It’s not bad, I promise.”

 

Josie stopped, staring down at Penelope inquisitively, no doubt still preparing herself for the worst.

 

“I had a lot of time to think while I was gone, about everything… and I think… I think I can forgive her.”

 

“What?”

 

“I know it sounds out of left field but... there was a moment after I attacked you when I felt so _helpless_ , knowing I couldn’t go back to make sure you were okay. I wanted to protect you more than anything, and I ended up losing myself in the process… and I think that’s what happened with your mom too.”

 

“That’s no excuse, though. You couldn’t help what happened, Penelope, but she _willingly_ did what she did. There’s no excuse for that.”

 

“No, of course there isn’t. I can’t pretend like she didn’t take everything away from me, Josie, and I can never forget it…”

 

Josie averted her eyes, dropping her head down, visibly bracing herself for what was coming next. Using her thumb and forefinger, Penelope lifted the girl’s chin up to meet her eyes again, desperate for Josie to hear the truth in her words, “But I can try to forgive her… I’m _going_ to try to forgive her.”

 

“What… what made you decide that?”

 

“Your mom took everything from me, Josie… No amount of apologizing can ever bring them back but… but she also gave me you.”

 

“Pen-”

 

“Just let me finish, okay?” Josie nodded, rubbing her thumb across the top of Penelope’s left hand. “My family’s gone, but you’re here. And I can’t help but think that… _maybe_ – maybe this is how it was always supposed to be. I know it in my heart that I was meant to find you, Jo. And after everything we’ve been through… I’m not going to let anything come between us ever again.”

 

Josie stared back at her for a few moments after she had finished speaking, expression unreadable until she finally lifted herself off of the bed entirely and headed in the direction of the television.

 

“Josie? Where are you going?”

 

Switching it off, she turned to face Penelope again, smile tugging on her lips, hand outstretched in front of her, “Dance with me.”

 

“There’s no music...”

 

“I know. Just trust me.”

 

Pushing herself off the bed, Penelope made her way to the center of the room and stopped barely a few inches away from Josie, waiting for the girl to make the next move.

 

Josie took one step forward, effectively closing the distance between them entirely, leading Penelope’s hands to her waist and moving her own to link them behind Penelope’s neck, hugging their bodies together as they began to sway to a melody only they could hear.

 

 _“We can dance if we want to_  
We can leave your friends behind  
Cause your friends don't dance  
And if they don't dance  
Well, they’re no friends of mine”

 

The sound of Josie’s voice overtook Penelope, the softness of it echoing around them, lighting every dark crack and crevice until the entire room was bathed in the warmest and most beautiful light Penelope had ever seen.

 

_“We can go where we want to_  
_A place where they'll never find_  
_We can act like we've come from out of this world_  
_Leave the real one far behind_  
_And we can dance_  
_We can dance_  
_We can dance_  
_We can dance”_

 

They were holding onto each other more tightly, and Penelope could now see the soft red glow radiating off of Josie’s body. Siphoning had always been a very personal experience to Josie, something that she had only ever done with the people she loved and trusted enough to make herself vulnerable with, and Penelope remembered every single time she had done it with her.

Every single book she had ever read on the Gemini twins told her that it was supposed to hurt, but it only ever did the exact opposite. It made her feel safe.

 

 _“We can go where we want to_  
_The night is young_  
_And so am I_  
_We can dress real neat from our hands to our feet_  
_And surprise ‘em with a victory cry_  
_We can act if we want to_  
_If we don't nobody will_  
_You can act real rude_  
_And totally removed_  
_And I can act like an imbecile”_  


Penelope felt a cool gust of wind flow through the room and watched as snowflakes began to fall all around them, reminding her of the days they had spent together, and the look in Josie’s eyes the first time Penelope had cast this same spell for her. It was a promise back then, a promise to spend the rest of her life loving Josie Saltzman with everything in her, and she knew it was a promise now too.

 

_“We can dance if we want to_  
_We've got all your life and mine_

_As long as we abuse it_  
_We're never gonna lose it_  
_Everything will turn out right_  
_We can dance if we want to_  
_We can leave your friends behind_  
_Cause, your friends don't dance_  
_And if they don't dance_  
_Well, they're no friends of mine”_

 

This was forever. This was exactly how Penelope wanted to feel every day for the rest of her life. 

This was home.

 

Backing away from Josie just enough to be able to look at her, Penelope saw tired eyes staring back into her own, slightly red and glazed over under heavy eyelids, but she was smiling. It was enough to warm Penelope's entire body, “You learned the spell…”

 

“I didn’t want us to forget. I didn’t want you to lose what this feels like.”

 

Loving Josie Saltzman was the best thing Penelope had ever done.

 

“I need to ask you something."

 

"Okay..."

 

"I thought a lot about us while I was gone…”

 

She moved away from Josie, walking backward towards her side of the bed, “I thought about the first time I saw you, and the way you looked at me that day… and I thought about every day we’ve spent together since.”

 

Turning her back to Josie, and kneeling down to open the bottom drawer of the bedside table, she reached her hand inside of it, “I’ve never loved anyone the way that I love you, Jojo… and I never will.”

 

When she stood up again, her eyes fell to the clock on the table. _Ten seconds to midnight._

“I want forever… and I want it with you.”

 

_Five._

 

“… P-Penny?”

 

_Four._

 

Penelope turned around to face Josie, hands shaking and heart beating out of her chest, “ So, Josette Saltzman…”

 

_Three._

 

“I-I think something’s wrong…”

 

_Two._

 

“Josie?”

 

_One._

 

“I don’t what’s hap-”

 

Josie’s eyes rolled back into her head, eyelashes fluttering closed as she let out the most ragged gasp Penelope had ever heard, collapsing to the floor.

 

“Josie!”

 

Penelope’s senses went into overdrive. Her feet reacted before her mind could. She caught Josie just in time before her body hit the floor, lowering her down to lay her across her lap.

 

“Josie? Josie, look at me.”

 

No breathing pattern. No reflexes. No heartbeat to listen for.

 

“Josie, wake up. Hey... Jojo, please?”

 

She heard Izzie’s voice in her head. “ _Find an anchor, Penelope. Let it guide you.”_ She bit into her wrist, quickly bringing it down to Josie’s lips, instincts pushing her forward the way that her mind couldn’t.

 

“Please… please, wake up… _Josie,_ _wake up_!”

 

But it wouldn’t work. She wouldn’t feed. Penelope was holding Josie’s body in her arms, begging her to stay when she was already gone.

 

“Please… please don’t leave me…”

 

Her eyes were burning, tears falling freely and soaking her shirt as her throat fought back something between a sob and a shout. She held Josie’s body tighter against her chest, clinging to her until Penelope's knuckles were white and she couldn’t breathe anymore so she did the only she could still do. She took Josie’s hand in hers, and traced the three words into her palm exactly like she had the first time she and Josie spent the night together, the first time Josie ever told her she loved her, the day that Penelope found a family in Josie Saltzman...  **I love you.**

 

And then she gave up.

 

_It’s like a light switch in your mind; when you’ve gone through enough pain to last you a lifetime, when you don’t know if you have it in you to fight, and when you realize that you have no reason to anymore._

_Your love’s gone. She’s gone and humanity’s not worth a damn without her so you turn it off, flip the switch… and for the first time in as long as you can remember, you feel nothing._

_You let go, stand up, breath in, breath out._

_You look down at the sight at your feet and you’re numb to it, so you walk out, calm as day, quiet as night. You leave the room you had spent the last three years of your life in, and you don’t look back._

_You don’t look back to see the clock strike 12:01AM. You don’t look back at the girl you left lying dead on the floor. And you don’t look back to the small black box you dropped a few feet away from the bed._

_This is the first day of the rest of your life, and you wouldn’t change it for the world._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [[[Please leave me your thoughts. I love reading them even though I don't usually reply on here]]]  
> If you want to have a conversation about this update or this fic or life in general, i'll be lurking over at @voidpen on Twitter. I also have a curiouscat account if you want to come yell at me anonymously.


	10. Day 0

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vamp! Penelope with her humanity off would be a dangerous thing to be around, wouldn't you say?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some things may not make sense in this chapter, but don't worry, I'll explain them in the next one.

Blood. That was the first thing she tasted when she came to, the first thing she smelled. Her head was throbbing – spinning, a faint buzzing behind her eyes telling her she had been out for quite some time.

 

She moved her arms slowly, trying to make out her surroundings as best as she could without relying too much on her blurred sight. Slowly, she brought her hands to her sides, lifting her upper body off the floor until she was sitting up. She felt off, almost like she was missing something important, but unable to tell what it was exactly.

 

One of her hands felt different than the other, sticky. She brought it up closer to her eyes to examine it further, and found faint markings traced on her palm, letters drawn one over the other – all traced in blood, too messy to make out.

 

She stayed still for a few moments after that, still dazed but trying her best to remember where she was – why she had woken up on the floor of what looked like her and Penelope’s dorm room.

 

 _Penelope_.

 

It hit Josie like a ton of bricks, panic surging through her, jolting her back to reality. She was dancing with Penelope. It was snowing. She was singing.

 

She was watching it all play out in her mind.

 

They were getting close to midnight, Josie’s 22nd birthday, and they were holding each other, swaying to a melody only they could hear until Penelope let go. Walking towards the nightstand on her side of the bed, Penelope had only turned her back to Josie for a few seconds.

 

She remembered the way her heart began to beat faster, anticipation building for something she felt was coming, and it was then that it had happened. Josie had felt her heart drop and her throat constrict. She could no longer breathe, like the air had been sucked out of her lungs in a fraction of a second. She called out Penelope’s name, fear creeping onto her face faster than Penelope could turn to see.

 

She knew she was dead before she even hit the floor.

 

Josie shook her head, pushing the memories out of her mind for the time being, wanting to focus all of her energy into her body – into pushing herself off the floor. But while her first mistake was thinking she was strong enough to stand, getting up only to come crashing back down to the floor, her second mistake was somehow worse.

 

Her sight was coming back now, so she looked up and realized her instinct was right. The little black box was there, now slightly open to reveal what was inside. It was the ring Josie had tried to propose to Penelope with the night that Penelope had turned.

 

Penelope was going to propose to her, and Josie was gone before she could even hear her ask.

 

Shifting her gaze a little upwards, she noticed the clock on the bedside table. It was now 1:07 AM. She had been out for a little over an hour, and she had no idea where Penelope had gone, or what state she would be in once Josie found her.

 

Josie took a deep breath and tried to use what little strength was left in her arms to push herself up again, determined to make sure Penelope was okay.

 

She was relieved to find that it was easier this time, or maybe it was just the rush of adrenaline coursing through her veins. When she finally made it to her feet, shaky and unstable, the all-too-familiar feeling of dread hit her once again. She was forgetting something – something very important.

 

“ _Lizzie_.”

 

Her fear tripled, skyrocketing as she struggled to get her footing and reach her phone.

 

What if what had happened to her had also happened to Lizzie? No one had come looking for her. No one knew that she had died. That must have meant one of two things: either Lizzie hadn’t experienced what Josie had, or she had – but unlike Josie, she hadn’t woken up from it yet.

 

She sat on the edge of the bed, phone now in hand, wincing at the bright light coming from the screen. She quickly pulled up Lizzie’s number in her phone, pressing the ‘call’ button before she could even think twice about it. A few rings went by with no answer, and Josie’s anxiety was only getting worse.

 

“Come on… Pick up, pick up, pick u-”

 

**“Hi, you’ve reached Lizzie. Leave a message if you must – or maybe just text like a normal human being. Whatever, it’s up to you.”**

 

“Dammit, Lizzie!”

 

Josie’s mind was spinning now, unsure of what to do until she decided to try calling anyone within the university she knew could help her look for Lizzie. Settling on the first person she thought of, she quickly searched her contacts for their number, dialing it immediately. It only rang a couple of times before she heard the voice on the other end of the line.

 

“Josie? Is everything okay?”

 

“Hope, I need you to go check on Lizzie right now.”

 

“What? Why, what’s wrong?”

 

“Something happened. I think I just died and came back, and I’m worried Lizzie might have gone through the same bu-”

 

“I’ll find her, I promise. Are you okay?”

 

Josie was grateful for the urgency in Hope’s voice, especially since this wasn’t the time to explain everything. She knew how much the tribrid cared for her sister, and she was sure Hope would do anything to protect her, so that’s what Josie needed her to do.

 

“I’m fine, please just- just find Lizzie and text me the minute you do, okay?”

 

“I will, don’t worry. Is Penelope with you?”

 

“I-I have to go. Text me when you find her.”

 

“Jo-”

 

She hung up before she could give Hope more reason to worry about her instead of Lizzie. Thankfully, Josie hadn’t felt their twin connection break. In fact, she thought she could still sense her rather well, but she wouldn’t be able to rest before she made sure her sister was okay.

 

Looking down at her phone in her lap, Josie gazed at the photo she had set as her phone wallpaper. Hope had taken it when she and Penelope had first started dating. They had fallen asleep on Hope’s couch, curled up together under a thin blanket in the middle of winter, Josie’s head nuzzled under Penelope’s chin, legs intertwined, hands wrapped around each other.

 

Her heart ached when she remembered it, wanting more than anything for everything to go back to the way it was before, to when they were happily in love without a care in the world.

 

She dialed Penelope’s number, then, desperate to let the girl know she was alive. Lifting the phone to her ear, she thought she heard a faint buzzing near Penelope’s side of the bed. Reaching her body back across the bed, she pulled Penelope’s phone out from under the girl’s pillow, realizing that she must have left it behind.

 

Josie straightened up again, closing her eyes and focusing on slowing her heartbeat down. She was of no use to Penelope if she couldn’t calm herself down enough to be able to walk straight.

 

A few breaths later, she carefully dropped her feet to the ground, pushing herself off the bed slowly, and bent forward to pull her pants and shoes back on.

 

Having regained control of most of her senses, Josie pushed forward, opening the door to her and Penelope’s room, and stepping out into the hall. She was aware that it was late, mostly grateful she didn’t have to face suspicious or worried looks when all she could think about was finding Penelope. It was gnawing at her; this feeling that something had gone terribly wrong – that Penelope was in trouble.

 

Josie had only taken a few steps when the smell hit her. Something was burning. She followed the scent all the way to the back of the university until she saw her through the square glass window of one of the doors to the university’s biggest and oldest classrooms.

 

Penelope was standing with her back to Josie, completely still, hands linked together behind her back. She could see that there was a barrel in front of her, flames dancing out of it, lighting up Penelope’s side of the room and leaving the rest of it in the dark. The lights were all off on this side of the building, and the only sound Josie could make out for miles was the sparks of a fire.

 

Taking a deep breath, she laid her hand on the door handle, twisting and pushing it forward carefully to give herself enough room to walk inside quietly. Her footsteps were slow, but she kept walking forward towards Penelope.

 

“P-Penny?”

 

The girl didn’t move, didn’t flinch, didn’t react. Her head was still angled towards the fire, watching it intently – almost entranced by it.

 

“Penelope… what are you doing?”

 

A reaction came then, Penelope lifted her head slowly, now staring straight ahead above the fire. She stayed like that for a few seconds, but when she finally turned around, the sight Josie was met with both confused and worried her.

 

“Jojo?”

 

Penelope was smiling, there was no blood anywhere near her, no veins popping up under her eyes, no fangs on display… but Josie knew something was wrong. Something was nagging at her, almost like a voice in her ear telling her to run, but she didn’t listen. She kept walking forward, staring straight at Penelope – noticing that the girl’s smile didn’t quite reach her eyes.

 

Josie only stopped moving forward when there was no distance left between the two of them, and she lifted up her arms to pull Penelope to her, wrapping the vampire in her arms tenderly, “Yeah, it’s me… it’s Josie… I’m okay.”

 

Penelope didn’t move, arms remaining behind her back. It was then that Josie got a good look at the barrel and what was burning inside of it, “Are you… burning your things?”

 

When no answer came, Josie pulled back to look into Penelope’s eyes, “Penelope, are you okay? Are you hurt?”

 

The girl’s smile faltered, but grew slightly wider before she opened her mouth to speak again, “No… I just don’t think you’re going to want to hug me when you look behind you.”

 

“What?”

 

Penelope motioned with her eyes, nodding over Josie’s shoulder to the back of the classroom, still completely in the dark.

 

Josie walked to the side of the room more urgently now, adrenaline filling up her for the umpteenth time that day, and pressed the switch responsible for lighting that section of the room up.

 

Her heart dropped the second that she saw them.

 

“… Davina?”

 

Confusion coursed through her, quickly replaced with increasing levels of panic as she ran towards the girl. Davina was slouched in a chair, arms and legs tied; mouth covered with a piece of cloth.

 

A short distance away, Josie could see her mom, tied to a chair the same way Davina was, only unlike Davina, steam would rise from her wrists and ankles every time she moved slightly.

 

_Vervain._

 

“Mom…?”

 

As she got closer to them, kneeling in front of her mom, Josie could tell that they were both unconscious. She rounded on Penelope before the shock took its toll and she forgot how to speak properly, “Penelope… what is this? What are you doing?”

 

The girl didn’t react beyond a faint shrug of her shoulders, clearly unfazed, “I was bored. Thought I’d have some fun.”

 

“What are you talking about? Let them go!”

 

Penelope tilted her head and looked up, making a show of considering Josie’s demands, “Can’t do that, Jojo.”

 

“This isn’t you…”

 

The smile returned to her face, “Are you sure? Look closer…”

 

Josie walked forward again, breathing unsteady, hands shaking at her sides, and looked at the girl standing in front of her. She looked like Penelope, she sounded like Penelope, but… something was different – something was missing. That was when Josie noticed it: the Penelope Park she knew had never been this cold. It was as if all of the warmth had been sucked out of her, and a wall was now standing firmly in front of her, making it practically impossible for Josie to get through. That was when she figured it out.

 

This was what happened when a vampire was faced with the most traumatic sight of their life. Realization struck: the Penelope she knew was gone.

 

“You turned your humanity off.”

 

“Ding, ding, ding! I forget how smart you are sometimes.”

 

The smirk that spread across Penelope’s face and the way she raised her voice made Josie wince, “Penelope, I can’t imagine what you’re feeling right now, but hurting my mom and Davina’s not going to make you feel better.”

 

Penelope frowned, crossing her arms in front of her chest, clearly feigning confusion, “What do you mean? Of course, it will. Caroline Forbes took everything from me, remember? Surely, you can’t expect me to forget that.”

 

“No, but you said you were going to try to forgive her.”

 

Josie felt like she was walking on eggshells, trying to stall and give herself some time to find a way to get them all out of this mess without anyone getting hurt in the process.

 

With an eyebrow raise and an innocent look in her eyes, Penelope replied, “Oh, sweetheart… that was back when I gave a damn.”

 

“Alright, fine. I get it, you hate my mom. But what does Davina have to do with any of this?”

 

“It was just supposed to be your mom, really. I’m not a _monster_. Davina was just at the wrong place at the wrong time. So, I guess now… the decision’s up to you, Jojo.”

 

Josie flinched at the way Penelope’s old nickname for her rolled off the girl’s tongue, but she recovered before Penelope could see, “What are you talking about? Penelope, let them go.”

 

“You poor thing… that’s not how this works. You…”

 

That was when Penelope began to inch towards her, a soft expression on her face, closing the distance between them until they were close enough for Penelope to whisper in her ear, sending goosebumps trailing where the girl’s breath met Josie’s skin.

 

“… have to choose,” Penelope’s fingers toyed with Josie’s hand for a few seconds before she began circling around her, “Who would you rather lose, Josie? Your mom, the woman who murdered innocents so you could live… or your friend, the girl who moved her life across the country to try and save yours? I’ll give you 2 minutes to decide – 3 if you ask nicely-”

 

A surge of confidence enveloped Josie, pushing her to reach forward and grab Penelope’s arm, trying to siphon from her… but it didn’t work. That was when Josie understood what had happened. Penelope _had_ broken the Gemini curse, but without it, the twins had no powers. They didn’t follow the rules that were set for them, and as a result, they were stripped of their abilities.

 

They were human now.

 

Penelope smirked, catching up on Josie’s train of thought, “So, your siphoning’s gone, huh? That’s a waste. We could’ve had some fun.”

 

Josie barely had time to process the loss before she was forced back to reality by the sound of Penelope’s voice.

 

“Penelope, this isn’t you.”

 

The girl was moving back towards the fire when Josie said those words, but she stopped suddenly, turning around with a blank, unreadable expression on her face.

 

“Sure it is. You just don’t recognize me because you’ve never seen what I look like when I’m not in love you.”

 

Josie felt the ground being pulled from beneath her. Hearing Penelope say that she didn’t love her anymore was one of Josie’s biggest fears, and even though the girl had always tried to make her see that it would never happen – no matter many times Penelope said she would love her for the rest of their lives – Josie had never been able to discount the possibility that she might not be able to.

 

But this wasn’t Penelope, and this wasn’t the time to feel bad about herself.

 

“Choose…” Penelope said, eyebrow raised, “or I’ll have to choose for you.”

 

“You won’t. The Penelope I know is still in there.”

 

“Are you sure? Are you willing to risk it? You better decide soon because… Oh look, you’re almost out of time.”

 

Josie followed Penelope’s eyes to the clock on the wall, “Penelope, I know you don’t want to do this. You can fight it.”

 

“3… 2…”

 

“Stop! Please, just- just turn your humanity back on, okay? I’m fine, I’m alive, you don’t have to do this anymore. You can come back now. We can be together… forever. I want to marry you, Penelope. I want to spend the rest of my life with you so _please_ , please Penny... come back to me…”

 

The tears were streaming down her face freely now, and she actually thought she might have gotten through to the girl.

 

They had learned about emotional triggers for vampires when they were younger, and Josie was now realizing that maybe… maybe she was Penelope’s. She was hopeful when the girl hesitated, and for a second, Josie thought she saw a glimpse of the old Penelope staring back at her… but she was gone before Josie could hold on to her.

 

The illusion of empathy was now painted across Penelope’s face, “1… Sorry, Jojo… time’s up. Guess you’ll just lose them both.”

 

Her mouth was dry, eyes unblinking – glued to Penelope, heart pounding relentlessly against her chest. She whispered in disbelief, shaking her head, “Don’t do this-”

 

“Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

 

“No!”

 

Josie could’ve sworn it all happened in under a second.

 

She saw Penelope lift and break a chair, watched as she threw the two sharpest pieces to the back of the room, each aimed at one of the people Josie cared about most in the world… but then things changed, and when she looked to the back of the room, she saw Izzie standing in front of Davina, hand holding the stake that was headed straight for the girl’s heart in front of her, and she noticed that the piece that was flying towards her mom was now flat against the ground.

 

The commotion must have woken her mom and Davina up because the witch was now staring up at Izzie in shock, chest rising and falling with each heavy breath, and eyes wide.

 

“Well, look who’s decided to join us. Here to save your girlfriend, Iz?”

 

But before Izzie could even respond, Josie heard another voice coming from behind Penelope.

 

“No, Pen.”

 

And the second thing she heard was the sound of Hope snapping Penelope’s neck, Lizzie close on her trail as Penelope’s body hit the ground.

 

“We’re here to save you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, thank you for reading! If you're finding this to be too angsty, believe me, so am I, but it's out of my hands at this point [BUT IT'LL GET BETTER] There's going to be 2-3 chapters left depending on whether I'm going to write an epilogue set further down the line, but I'll see what happens. I'm going to try to finish writing and posting the rest of the chapters this week, so it *should* *hopefully* be done and up by this time next week.
> 
> Let me know what you thought of this chapter, please, and thank you so much for reading!
> 
> PS: I changed my Twitter handle to @pensalvatore in case you want to talk there or on curiouscat.


	11. Day 0, pt. 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Josie figures it out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't need to tell you guys, but this chapter was always bound to be sad given that Penelope's humanity is off, but it ends on a hopeful note. If you've watched The Vampire Diaries, it might feel familiar to you.

The first time Penelope opened her eyes, she knew she was trapped. Her arms were tied to a chair by her wrists – legs bound by her ankles. Her head was propped up upright so she was looking directly up at the ceiling, clearly able to make out the faded markings all around her, covering the wall tiles almost as if telling a story.

 

The only light in the room came from the few torches perched up on either side of her – one to her left and another to her right, bathing the room in soft light – flames dancing across the walls.

 

She could smell the faint scent of burning flesh, and quickly realized it was her own. Her wrists were sore, stinging whenever she tried to move, a direct effect of the Vervain-covered ropes wrapped tightly around them.

 

She didn’t know what time it was, and she had no way of telling. There were no windows in sight, no natural light coming in from any cracks or crevices in the stone walls, no breeze coming in from any openings. The air was completely still, and the quiet was disconcerting. She quickly realized she was being held underground.

 

Penelope lowered her head, eyes adjusting to the dimness fully now. She could tell that someone was sitting in the corner near the door and noticed that, whoever it was, they weren’t moving.

 

With a lot more effort and a little bit of squinting, Penelope was able to tell that it was Josie. The girl was sitting sideways on a large chair – knees pulled up to her chest with what looked like a heavy blanket covering her.

 

She was beginning to feel lightheaded again. Her neck felt sore and her body felt weak and heavy. She felt like she hadn’t slept in weeks, eyelids fluttering closed of their own accord, and before she could fight the dryness in her throat and the low rumble of her stomach – warnings and reminders of the last time she fed, she felt herself drift back to sleep.

 

When she woke up again, unsure how much time had passed since she had last been conscious, she heard quiet voices around her, and she could only see well enough to know who they belonged to.

 

“I’ll watch her for a bit. You should get some sleep. There’s a bed upstairs-”

 

“No, I-I’m fine here.”

 

“Josie… you need to rest.”

 

“I’ll have plenty of time to rest once I know she’s going to be okay.”

 

“Jo… you’re no use to Penelope if you’re too tired to keep your eyes open-”

 

“Don’t, Hope… please. You have no idea what this feels like.”

 

“You’re right, I don’t… but I do know you were dead just a few hours ago, and I know for a fact that that’s not something you can just brush off. You need to give yourself time to heal.”

 

“I can’t leave her… not after everything.”

 

“Alright, but I’m staying with you.”

 

“You don’t need to-”

 

“I know, but I want to, and I think there’s something we need to talk about.”

 

“What is it?”

 

“I think I figured out what happened – why you and Lizzie came back.”

 

“And?”

 

“I think this was the loophole we were looking for all along. I think when Penelope’s coven placed the curse on the Gemini twins, they unknowingly created a loophole. If the last of the Polaris coven died before the twins turned 22, their powers would be stripped from them… and since the weaker one didn’t die so the stronger one could survive, they would _both_ die, but they wouldn't stay dead.”

 

“What do you mean?”

 

“Theoretically, you would only have to stay dead long enough for your powers to dissipate… in this case, you woke up before Lizzie which means-”

 

“She’s the stronger twin.”

 

“Yes… but that doesn’t matter now. Penelope saved you both, Jo. Now we just need to focus on saving her.”

 

Penelope knew what was happening now – was able to piece together what had happened and how long ago it had happened, and finally understood why she felt so weak. They were draining her, prolonging the desiccation period as much as possible, and giving her just enough blood to keep her alive, but not nearly enough to keep her conscious for more than a few minutes at a time – ensuring she couldn’t escape.

 

She felt the now-familiar drowsiness taking over her again, pulling her back into the darkness no matter how hard she tried to fight it.

 

The third time she woke up, Davina and Izzie were there. Izzie was pacing a short distance away from her, and Davina was now occupying the chair Josie had fallen asleep in the last time Penelope had woken up. She had to strain to hear what they were saying because of how low their voices were.

 

“Iz… are you okay?”

 

“Hmm? Yeah, yeah… I’m fine.”

 

“It’s alright if you’re not, you know…”

 

“It’s just… I can’t help but think this is all my fault.”

 

“It’s not.”

 

“Isn’t it, though? I’m the one who turned her. We wouldn’t even be here if I hadn’t said yes.”

 

“Izzie, look at me.”

 

Penelope watched as Izzie stopped pacing and looked down at Davina.

 

“ _None_ of this is your fault. Josie and Lizzie would be dead right now if you hadn’t agreed to do what you did, and I can promise you Penelope would be much worse off because of it.”

 

“What if this doesn’t work?”

 

“It will, I know it will. Listen… I know how Penelope means to you… and everybody’s doing everything they can to bring her back. I just- I want you to know that I’m here for you… if you need me.”

 

“I know you are, thank you. Are you feeling alright?”

 

“I am… because of you. You saved me, remember?”

 

“You saved me first.”

 

“Izzie… there’s something I need to tell you.”

 

“Is something wrong?”

 

“No, it’s just… do you remember the night we met?”

 

“You know I do.”

 

“Well, I think I do too.”

 

“How’s that possible? I compelled you-”

 

“I know, I don’t remember it exactly but… I think I know what happened.”

 

“Dav-”

 

“Just let me tell you, okay? I need to tell you and I don’t think I’ll have the courage to do it in the morning.”

 

“Okay.”

 

“My clearest memory from that night was seeing Josie and Penelope hovering over me at the party. They told me I was bit, but I didn’t remember any of it, so I realized whoever fed on me compelled me to forget. I thought you were just trying to cover your tracks, but when I saw you again at the bar, I… felt like we’d met before. The way you looked at me that night… it felt familiar – like you’d looked at me like that before. And then, when I actually got to know you… I started seeing you differently. I saw the kindest person I’ve ever met, and I realized you wouldn’t have hurt me… not if I hadn’t let you.”

 

“Davina, I-”

 

“I told you to do it, didn’t I?”

 

“I… I was starving. I hadn’t fed in a while and I had just gotten to town… didn’t know where the Vervain supply began and ended. For some reason, you came up to me, and we just started talking. You were so comfortable to talk to that I ended up opening up to you about myself, and I guess you trusted me too because… you told me about Kol.”

 

It was quiet for a few moments after that before Penelope heard Izzie’s voice again.

 

“Dav, we don’t have to talk about this-”

 

“Yes, we do. Please…”

 

“Okay. You said that he was the only person in the world who made you feel safe… who challenged you and made you feel like you could do anything. You told me he had passed away, and I took your hand, said I was sorry for your loss, and told you I was sure that, wherever he was in that moment, he was watching over you, and that he was lucky to have been loved by someone as beautiful as you. You smiled at me, and…”

 

“Then what?”

 

“I guess you reached your other hand forward to brush an eyelash off my face or something because your wrist grazed my cheek and… you saw me. You saw the way my eyes changed and I got up to leave before I could see your reaction. I wasn’t expecting you to follow me out but you did and-”

 

“I told you to feed on me.”

 

“Yeah… Listen, Davina, I need you to know that I wouldn’t have done it if-”

 

“I know… can I ask you something?”

 

“Anything.”

 

“Why did you compel me to forget you?”

 

“I guess I was afraid you’d wake up the next day and we’d cross paths and you’d… look at me differently. The last thing I wanted was to hurt you and the thought of you being afraid of me just- I guess I just couldn’t bear to see you look at me like I was a monster.”

 

“You’re not a monster, Iz. You’re pretty much the exact opposite.”

 

There was another moment of silence during which the pair just looked at each other, and Penelope could see that it was Izzie who had looked away first.

 

“I should probably go see if they need anything upstairs-”

 

“I think I’m falling in love with you.”

 

“… What?”

 

“I think… I think I’m falling in love with you. I’ve had feelings for you for a while now, and I knew… I know how you feel about Penelope. I think I’m falling in love with you but you’re in love with someone else, and that’s oka-”

 

The sudden shift in the room told Penelope everything she needed to know, and she wasn’t too partial to public displays of affection given the state that she was currently in, so she finally spoke up, “Well, aren’t you two just adorable?”

 

“P-Penelope?”

 

“Say, Iz… if I confessed my undying love for you right now, would you consider maybe loosening up some of these restraints?”

 

“I’ll get Josie.”

 

“Yeah, I-I’ll come with you.”

 

“Oh, come on! We were just starting to have some fun-”

 

Just as the door shut behind Davina and Izzie with a loud thud, Penelope felt another presence in the room – lurking in the shadows, causing the hairs on the back of her neck to stand up. She knew who this was.

 

“What are you doing here?”

 

“Trying to help you.”

 

“I don’t _need_ any help and believe me, even if I did, I definitely wouldn’t ask you for it.”

 

“That’s fair, I guess. I have to hand it to you, though, I didn’t see you coming. I’d just gotten into town and I was heading to surprise the twins on their birthday and you completely caught me off guard. You’re a lot stronger than I thought you’d be.”

 

“Am I supposed to be flattered?”

 

Her frustration was only intensified by Caroline’s presence in the room. With her humanity off, Penelope was able to shut out pain in all its forms – focusing solely on superficial feelings – and at that moment, all she felt was irritation. She tried, once again, to fight against the restraints keeping her trapped in the chair but it was no use, and the sting of the Vervain only aggravated her more.

 

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

 

Penelope scoffed, rolling her eyes, “Did they send you here to babysit me?”

 

“No, they don’t know I’m here. I was hoping I might be able to talk some sense into you.”

 

“You want to help me... after I just tried to kill you.”

 

“Penelope… we both know I’ve done much worse than that.”

 

A sudden menacing thought flashed across Penelope’s mind, but she was able to repress it before it toppled over the surface to disturb the cold indifference she had chosen to adopt. A shiver ran up her spine as sweat drops rolled down her face.

 

She didn’t want to talk about this.

 

“I never expected you to forgive me for what I did. I actually wouldn’t blame you if you hated me for the rest of your life, but Josie… she cares about you, more than I’ve ever seen her care about anyone. And even if you don’t believe me when I say that I care about you too, you have to believe that I’d do anything for my daughter.”

 

“Yeah, don’t worry. I know better than anyone how far you’re willing to go to save your family, remember?”

 

“Look, Penelope… I’ve been where you are now. I know what it’s like. You’re terrified. You’re scared that if you let yourself feel again… the weight of every emotion you’ve been bottling up inside of you for so long will consume you, and you’re afraid you won’t be strong enough to survive it… but you are. You’re one of the strongest, most resilient young women I’ve ever met, Penelope. You can fight this… and you’re not alone.”

 

“Spare me the speech, okay? If you really knew what this is like, you’d know that I don’t _care_ what you have to say. Besides, shouldn’t your daughter be here? Isn’t _she_ supposed to be my emotional trigger?”

 

“My daughter loves you, Penelope, and I know you love her too – enough to turn yourself into a vampire to save her life… enough to lose your family all over again to save her-”

 

There it was again, the nauseating tug in the pit of her stomach. Her breathing quickened – fingernails digging into the wood. Her words came out through clenched teeth.

 

“ _Don’t_. Don’t you dare talk about them.”

 

“They wouldn’t want this for you, Penelope. They wouldn’t want y-”

 

“I said, sto-”

 

The door opened before she could get all of her words out.

 

“Penny?”

 

Her stomach relaxed and her breathing steadied, not because Josie had just walked into the room, but because anything was a welcome distraction from Caroline’s incessant prodding.

 

“Mom, can you leave us?”

 

“Are you sure, sweetheart?”

 

“I am… please.”

 

Josie was quiet for a few moments, looking at her with a confidence that unnerved Penelope, “How are you feeling?”

 

“You have me tied to a Vervain-coated chair and I haven’t fed properly in hours, how do you _think_ I’m feeling?”

 

“Penelope… I know it’s hard but we’re doing this because we love you.”

 

“God, I’m so _sick_ of hearing you people say that. It’s like you’re not getting it through your heads _._ I don’t  _care_. It’s simple, really. You can’t bring your precious Penelope back because she’s not there anymore.”

 

“Well, you’re right about one thing. I can’t bring my love back… but he can.”

 

Josie closed the distance between them, stepping into the light of the torches near Penelope, allowing her to see the picture Josie was holding up… the picture she remembered giving Josie the day that she realized Josie was the girl she wanted to spend the rest of her life with.

 

For a while, Penelope could do nothing but stare back at it, mouth agape. It took Josie’s hand trembling slightly for the trance to break, allowing her to look away and swallow the lump in her throat.

 

 “I finally figured it out. I’ve been tossing and turning and it never even crossed my mind. I can’t believe I didn’t see it sooner. I’m not your trigger, I’ve never been… Benji is.”

 

A sense of dread overcame her, challenging the walls she had successfully put up around her the moment she turned off her humanity.

 

“What, no snarky comment? What’s the matter? You have nothing to say? Look at him, Penelope. Do you remember the day that you gave me this picture?”

 

“You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

 

“It was the day that you realized you were falling for me, back when we first started dating. You gave it to me to try and show me how serious you were about us… because it was the most important thing you had left.”

 

Her breathing picked up again, shallow and rapid, heart beating out of her chest, “Stop.”

 

“Do you remember the day the picture was taken? You told me it was your favorite memory you had of him. You were upset because your parents were moving you away for what felt like the twentieth time that year. You’d made the mistake of making a best friend for the first time in all of the years that had passed and the schools you’d been in. You loved her, and she loved you, and saying goodbye to her was one of the hardest things you’ve ever had to do. You went home crying your eyes out that day. You went straight to your room, locked your door, and wouldn’t let anyone in… except for him. You always let him in.”

 

Her eyes flashed red, veins popping under them as she felt her fangs begin to form.

 

“He was sad when he saw you, and he said he wanted to make you smile… so, he brought out the Spider-Man costume you’d gotten him for his birthday that year, and put it on. It was a little too big for him but he didn’t care, and neither did you. You were sad, and he just wanted to make you smile.

 

“Just stop, okay?! Stop!”

 

Her fangs were on full display now, the anger pushing her over the edge and sending her propelling towards the bottom.

 

“Do you know what you’re feeling now? That’s anger, but who are you really angry with, Penelope? Is it my mom? Because as horrifying as her actions are, she was only trying to save my life and Lizzie’s. Is it your parents? For not being able to protect him? They did the best they could to protect you both.”

 

She couldn’t answer. She didn’t think she had it in her to give Josie the answer she was looking for without crumbling down completely.

 

“No, the reason he’s gone, Penelope… is me. Benji would be alive right now if it weren’t for me. You would never have had to spend your lives on the run. You would never have had to grow up feeling isolated and alone. You could’ve been happy. You deserved to be happy… and I took that away from you, and then I took it away from you again. You lost your little brother for the second time, and it was because of me. So, if you want to be mad at someone, you should be mad at me.”

 

“You’re so fucking clueless, Josie. Believe it or not, not everything has to be about you.”

 

“Enlighten me, then. If you’re not angry with me, who else could you possibly be angry with-”

 

“ _Me!_ ”

 

Just like that, the walls began to crumble. She couldn’t hold it in any longer.

 

“What?”

 

“Don’t you get it? It’s _my_ fault. If I had just been there that day… if I had been with them in the car… I could’ve protected him. I know I could have. I could’ve gotten him out of there. I saved him before, I know I was strong enough to do it again. And now-”

 

“And now what?”

 

Her eyes were stinging and her throat felt like it was closing in on itself. Her voice broke and her hands were clutching the chair so hard her knuckles hurt.

 

“He’s… gone. I’m never going to see him again. He’s never going to get to grow up and have a life of his own, and it’s all… _my_ fault.”

 

Josie knelt in front of her and placed both of her hands on Penelope’s knees, eyes softening impossibly.

 

“No, Penelope, it’s not. There was nothing you could have done. You were the most amazing sister in the world, and you loved him so much, but you couldn’t have known… you couldn’t have saved him, and it’s not your fault.”

 

Tears were streaming down her face freely now. She’d been repressing this thought for as long as she could remember. She’d grown up trying to blame other people for her shortcomings to cover up for the fact that she actually blamed herself… even when logic screamed at her that she didn’t deserve it.

 

There was a great deal of turmoil inside of her now. Her new-found realization that she had been blaming herself for her little brother’s passing battling with what Josie had just told her.

 

A sudden realization dawned on her. She finally understood why she had worked herself to the ground trying to find a loophole to the merge. All those sleepless nights and all of that fear… it was all because she was afraid of losing Josie like she had lost Benji. She couldn’t save him, but she would save Josie no matter the cost.

 

“You saved my life, Pen. Now, I need you to save yours.”

 

She shook her head, voice breaking softly, “No, I can’t… I can’t-”

 

“Yes, you can… just let him back in. You love him, Penelope. Just let yourself remember.”

 

Josie’s voice shielded her, guiding her through the flood of memories that broke through her defenses and came crashing down on her– memories of her and her little brother. It was as if she was reliving the day that picture was taken all over again.

**“I know how to make you feel better!”**

There was a glimmer in his eyes as he sat next to her, the idea had formed itself in his mind at that moment. He went to his room and came back a few minutes later, hands hidden because of how long the costume sleeves were – feet dragging on the floor.

 

**“Don’t be sad… I’ll save you!”**

 

“Please, Josie… just let me go. Just let me go-”

 

Her eyes were closed, eyebrow knitted as she fought against the wave of sorrow washing through her.

 

“You can do this, just let him in. I’m right here with you… I’m not going anywhere.”

 

**“I love you, Peez… please don’t cry.”**

 

The room was spinning – a bright light was shining from her bedroom window. Her memory of Benji was fading away.

 

“I… I love you too, Benji.”

 

She reached out for him, holding his hand between both of hers and squeezing tightly. He smiled at her and she smiled back. And suddenly, the room was bathed in the warmest light she had ever seen, but it was too bright. She squeezed her eyes shut and when she opened them again, she saw Josie in front of her – eyes watery and lips parted.

 

“You’re okay… you’re safe. I’m right here…”

 

That was when it all came hurtling down on her. Looking into Josie’s eyes, she couldn’t hold the floodgates shut any longer. Her humanity was back, and every ounce of pain was back with it.

 

Josie quickly undid the ropes holding her to the chair, working her way up from the ones at her ankles to the ones wrapped around her wrists. When she was done, Penelope pushed herself forward, collapsing into Josie’s arms and holding her as close as she possibly could, sobbing into her shoulder as Josie held her back just as tightly, stroking her hair.

 

Penelope hadn’t noticed the figures standing near the door until she looked up from Josie’s shoulder. It was all of her friends – the people who had been there for her every time she needed them to be… the people she loved most in the world… her family.

 

“I’m so sorry… I’m so sorry…”

 

“It’s okay… everything’s going to be okay now. I’ve got you.”

 

She clung onto those words with everything she had, and finally let herself go. The weight of the world was off of her shoulders, allowing her to breathe again. Her family was alive. Her family was safe.

 

And the only question left to be answered was one whose answer could change everything.

 

_Where do we go from here?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One last chapter to go.  
> Endgame is coming.


	12. Day 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The end[?]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last beginning-note I'll ever do for this fic. Totally not crying at all.

Penelope’s body and mind were both exhausted from the events of the previous day, but although she’d been in a daze throughout most of it, she could still remember and replay it very clearly in her mind.

 

She remembered coming in and out of consciousness, seeing Izzie and Davina kiss for the first time, hearing Caroline try to bring her back, watching Josie figure out how… It was almost too much for her to bear to think of all the pain she had caused them, but then she thought back to the moment she saw Benji again, the moment that she told him she loved him and finally let herself breathe again realizing that his death wasn’t her fault. She had spent so much of her life feeling like a failure – suffocating under the burden of things she had no control over, an accident she couldn’t have possibly prevented.

 

All of the burdens Penelope had been carrying around with her since that day had washed away the second she opened her eyes and saw the love of her life staring back at her with so much love it made her heart ache. She remembered falling into Josie’s arms and, burying her face in the crook of Josie’s neck and holding her so close it almost hurt.

 

It wasn’t until Josie broke through to her that she realized she hadn’t even been breathing, and finally, for the first time in a long time, she felt like herself again. She felt light.

 

Penelope looked down to her right and took in the girl lying next to her. Josie hadn’t left her side since she switched her humanity back on – not even for a second. Her long hair was scattered over Penelope’s shoulder, her expression peaceful, and her arm was wrapped around Penelope’s middle, pulling her closer every now and then.

 

She hadn’t realized how much time she had spent looking at Josie’s face until the corners of the girl’s lips turned up.

 

“Can’t sleep?”

 

She spoke with her eyes closed, the hint of a smile never leaving her face.

 

Penelope’s mouth felt dry, and her voice sounded strange somehow, almost as if she hadn’t heard it in a while, “I’d rather just look at you.”

 

Josie looked up at her then, and Penelope realized how close they actually were. Her eyes fell down to Josie’s lips, suddenly aware of the fact that they hadn’t kissed since that night in their room. She wanted nothing more than to close the distance between them and kiss the girl, but something was holding her back still, so she was relieved when Josie closed it instead.

 

The girl brought her hand up to cup Penelope’s cheek, lips moving over hers softly. Penelope felt the same familiar trail of goosebumps running down her body that she felt every time Josie kissed her, and pulled the girl closer, moving her lips to the rhythm Josie had set.

 

It made her heart race, knowing that, after all of these years, everything about Josie still made her fall deeper. Her eyes, her smile, her scent, her touch… Penelope knew her heart never stood a chance against Josie Saltzman.

 

“I missed you.”

 

“Pen… it’s only been a couple of days-”

 

“I know.”

 

Penelope lifted her hand to Josie’s face, fingers tracing down her jawline lightly, almost as if committing it all to memory for the thousandth time. It was Josie who spoke next a few seconds later, intertwining their hands over Penelope’s chest, “How’re you feeling?”

 

“Bit tired… but better knowing you’re here,” Her words came out as a whisper, “You always make me feel better.”

 

Something about her words or the way she said them must’ve worried Josie, causing her expression to soften impossibly.

 

“I love you; you know that, right?”

 

Penelope let her thoughts drift back to the past few years, and everything she and Josie had been through – from learning she was the key to stopping the merge, to finding out Caroline had been the one responsible for her family’s deaths, to asking Izzie to turn her so that her and Josie wouldn’t have to live in fear anymore, to shutting off her humanity the moment she thought Josie was dead.

 

“What are you thinking about?”

 

She realized she had been staring down at their hands, still intertwined, thumb tracing random patterns over Josie’s hand, and looked up when she heard the girl’s voice.

 

“We’ve been through so much, Jo… so much pain, and loss, and fear… most of it because of me but still, throughout all of it… you never gave up on me.”

 

Penelope moved her lips to the top of Josie’s head, pressing a featherlight kiss to her temple, “You’re always saving me. I guess I just don’t know what I’d do without you.”

 

Silence lay over them until Josie began to stir, “You should get some rest.”

 

She disentangled herself from Penelope’s arms and got out of the bed unexpectedly, taking all of the warmth they had been wrapped in for the past few hours with her.

 

“Where are you going?”

 

“There’s something I need to do. I’ll be back before you wake up, I promise.”

 

She gave Penelope a last lingering kiss and turned for the door. She was already halfway out of the room by the time Penelope was able to say another word, “Josie…”

 

“Yeah?”

 

She wasn’t sure what she wanted to say exactly, or why she felt the need to say it in that moment, but Penelope felt like something was different now – something had changed. She couldn’t quite place her finger on it, so she couldn’t ask Josie what it was, but she could tell her the one thing she knew would always put a smile on Josie’s face.

 

“I love you.”

 

The smile she only ever saw when Josie was looking at her.

 

“I love you too. I’ll see you in a bit.”

 

Penelope tried her best to sleep after that, but she was too restless and missed the warmth of Josie’s body wrapped around hers. She guessed she was finally able to understand what Josie meant when she used to say she couldn’t sleep properly without her. Surrendering herself to the reality of the situation, Penelope decided to step outside for some fresh air instead and, lifting herself from the bed, headed straight for the door.

 

Josie had told her they’d moved her from the underground cellar to a house Caroline rented when the twins had told her they wanted to go to university in the city. It reminded Penelope of the Salvatore school. It had a lot of the same designs, same colors, same way of making you feel welcome… The same way of making you feel at home.

 

No one was around by the time she reached the front porch, and the house was away from the main road and surrounded by more than enough trees to make it practically invisible to anyone that happened to pass by.

 

Penelope sat down on the steps of the house, staring ahead at nothing in particular, replaying the events of the past few days in her mind. She realized this was the calmest she had felt in a while. It was almost like she had finally gotten closure. Everything felt like it was finally coming together, and yet she couldn’t help but listen to that voice in her head telling her that it wouldn’t last. It couldn’t. And as hard as she tried to convince herself otherwise, she knew the voice was right.

 

Her train of thought was cut short by the sound of footsteps approaching quickly behind her, and the voice of the person they belonged to, “There you are! I thought you left... I went back to the room and couldn’t find you so… I was worried.”

 

Josie sat down next to her tentatively, turning to face her.

 

“I’d never leave you again, Jo… even if I still believe you’d be better off without me. I’ve put you through so much but I’m not leaving you again… not unless you ask me to.”

 

“Why would you ever think I would want that?”

 

Penelope hesitated. Saying it out loud meant they had to talk about it. It meant it could change them forever. Maybe that’s what Josie was thinking about earlier too. Maybe things had already changed, and it was too late for her to do anything about it.

 

“Because… you’re human now. You’re human and I’m a vampire and there’s only one way this can end. One of us is going to get hurt one day, Josie… and I can’t bear the thought of it being you.”

 

“What if I told you there was another way?”

 

Penelope frowned; confusion painted over her face. This wasn’t how she was expecting the conversation to go, “What do you mean?”

 

“What if… what if I told you I didn’t want 30 years? What if I told you I didn’t want 50? What if I told you… I didn’t want a lifetime?”

 

“Josie, what are you talking about-”

 

“What if I told you… I want an eternity, Penelope?”

 

Penelope’s heart jumped, her breath catching in her throat.

 

“What if I told you I want forever?”

 

“You don’t mean that... you can’t mean that.”

 

“I do...”

 

Josie lifted her hand to her mouth, closed her eyes, and when she opened them again, her hand was balled up into a fist between the two of them, blood running down the side of it.

 

“And I didn’t do it for you.”

 

When Josie opened her hand again for Penelope to see, the wound had already healed, and if it weren’t for the traces of blood covering Josie’s palm, it would’ve been as if the bite had never even been there.

 

It was then that Penelope realized what had been different about Josie. She’d already made her decision earlier, and now… she had the rest of eternity to regret it.

 

“What did you do?”

 

“Penelope-”

 

“Josie, what did you do?!”

 

“I asked my mom to do it. She wouldn’t agree to it at first but… eventually, she understood. I’m old enough and smart enough to know what I want – to know what this means… and she understands that. I’ve thought about it for a while now, Pen. I’ve been thinking about it since the day you turned.”

 

Penelope shook her head, eyes wide in disbelief, “No… no, why would you do this?”

 

She stood up abruptly, walking down the steps to try to put some distance between her and Josie, so frantic that she hadn’t even noticed it had started to rain, and Josie had to raise her voice for Penelope to hear her.

 

“Because I love you! Because nothing matters without you! Because when I thought you died, I wanted to burn everything to the ground and go down with it! Because when I woke up yesterday and you weren’t there, I was terrified! Because every time I think about what my life would be like without you in it, I feel empty! Because I’ve been in love with you since we were seventeen and too young to even know what love was, Penelope! Because you say that I’m always saving you when the truth is you’re the one who’s always saving me.”

 

She stopped pacing and stood still until Josie walked down the steps and headed towards her, backing away only when Josie stepped too close – wincing at the look of pain that flashed across Josie’s face when she did.

 

“Pen… say something? Please?”

 

Her eyes stung. Her emotions were heightened and it took everything in her not to start crying right then and there, “I’m scared.”

 

“What are you scared of?”

 

Josie took a tentative step forward, and Penelope took another step back. One last line of defense against the rush of emotions she was afraid would come soon.

 

“I’m scared you’ll wake up one day and regret this. Because I know… I _know_ my heart won’t be able to take it, Josie. If we’re together, if you promise me forever, I need you to be sure… and if you are then… I’ll spend the rest of forever loving you. But if you’re not, I promise I’ll find the cure for you, and you can live your life. You can be happy without me, Josie – I know you can. You deserve it more than anyone I’ve ever met. So I need you to tell me right now, right here. Are you sure this is what you want?”

 

Penelope’s voice betrayed her vulnerability. She was laying it all out in front of her for Josie to see. All of her cards were now on the table. Her heart was on full display, and Josie just had to decide what she wanted to do with it.

 

The girl’s gaze fell down between them, clearly deep in thought, so Penelope tried to make things simpler on her, even though she dreaded the answer to this question more than she would allow herself to ever admit, “Are you sure you want _me_?”

 

Josie looked up quickly, disbelief apparent on her face, forcing Penelope to look away. She wouldn’t make this harder than it had to be on Josie.

 

“Penelope, look at me…”

 

Josie used her forefinger to lift her chin up gently so their eyes could meet, and Penelope was suddenly aware of how hard the rain was coming down. Their clothes were practically soaked at this point, but neither of them seemed to care.

 

“I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life than I am about you. Whatever happens, wherever we end up… I  _promise_ you; I’ll spend every day making sure you know there’s nowhere else I’d rather be, no one else I’d rather be with… You’re my love, Penelope Park. You’re _my_ love. Nothing’s ever going to change that.”

 

Suddenly, the memory of stepping out of the car that had brought her to The Salvatore Boarding School for the Young & Gifted for the first time came to Penelope’s mind. She had no idea what was waiting for her at that school at the time, and no way of preparing herself for the girl that would turn her world upside down… the girl that would change her life forever.  She remembered the way Josie had looked at her that first time they met, and realized Josie was looking at her the exact same way now. So maybe, just maybe, this was fate.

 

_The girl who was destined to die and the girl who was destined to save her._

 

Maybe they were written in the stars after all.

 

“I love you!”

 

A smile lit up Josie’s face.

 

“For how long?”

 

They were shouting the words out to each other now, both smiling as wide as they probably ever had, the sounds of the storm drowning everything else out until all that was left was the two of them.

 

“For as long as you’ll let m-”

 

Josie came crashing into her before she’d even finished her sentence, their bodies pressed together so tightly that she could feel Josie’s heartbeat beating against her own chest. Penelope wrapped her arms around the girl she loved, kissing her deeply, hands twisting in her hair as the rain came down around them. They stayed like that for a few minutes before Josie pulled away to look into Penelope’s eyes, hands cradling either side of her face.

 

“Well, that’s good… because there’s actually something I’ve wanted to ask you for a while now.”

 

“Josie, what are you doing?”

 

“Third time’s the charm, right?

 

Their smiles only grew wider as Josie knelt down and pulled the familiar black box out of her jacket pocket, opening it and looking up at Penelope without an ounce of worry or doubt on her face.

 

They both knew this was forever.

 

“Penelope Park, will you marry me?”

 

* * *

 

 

_And that’s the way our story went._

_We got married with our friends and family there, surrounded by more love than I had ever thought possible. We spent the better part of a century together, traveling, seeing the world, experiencing as many things as possible… and it was hard at times, just like we both knew it would be. We had to watch the people we loved grow old and die, but we were there for each other every time. And we became stronger because of it._

_Eternity still feels too short. Forever still seems far away. One chapter of our story may have ended, but another one was just beginning. And looking back on how our story began, writing it all down so that we never forget, with the love of my life sleeping next to me in our new home… I can’t help but think about what Hope Mikaelson once said to us. Not one day has passed that made me question whether or not she was right. I know she was._

_This kind of love never dies._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright so, I have a few things to say/write if you'd like to listen/read.
> 
> First of all, I want to thank every single person who read, hit kudos, commented, subscribed, shared, etc... either part of this fic. It has honestly meant so, so much to me and I can't even put into words how happy you've all made me and how much I've loved writing this story and knowing people are reading.
> 
> Second, I know we're all sad now because it doesn't look like Penelope's coming back to the show anytime soon, but I just want to say that it'll be okay in the end. I know we'll see her on our screens soon, maybe not this season, but definitely in the one after.
> 
> Third, I definitely still want to keep writing about these two, and will probably be focusing on one-shots going forward, so if you'd like to keep up with my work, you can subscribe to me on here, or follow me on twitter @pensalvatore [I'm nice and I don't bite, I promise]
> 
> Finally, if you'd like to let me know what you thought of this chapter and fic as a whole, it would make my entire month and mean the entire world.
> 
> I love you all. Stay safe, stay hydrated, and please be kind to one another.
> 
> Love, voidpen


End file.
